The America’s Cup. 
Foreign yachting papers pay considerable 
attention to the efforts of Sir Thomas Lipton 
to arrange a race for the America’s Cup, and 
the Yachtsman sarcastically refers to the trophy 
as “America’s Cup,” and says, “The cup has 
long been in the possession of the New York 
Y. C. and is one of its most valuable assets, so 
valuable, indeed, that there is no intention of 
parting with it, and its value is very greatly 
enhanced by the very publicity given to the 
repeated efforts of foreign aspirants in their 
attempts to arrange terms under which they 
may kindly be permitted to race for a trophy 
tarnished by^ the actions of its holders. If the 
America’s Cup were held by any of several 
other leading yacht clubs in the United States, 
or by a committee representing the leading 
yacht clubs of the other side of the Atlantic, 
we should not, we think, have heard of the 
‘New Deed’—that shameful, but necessary in¬ 
strument—nor of the repeated refusals of Sir 
Thomas Lipton’s request to sad a fourth series 
of matches for the cup under the ‘Universal 
Rule.’ It seems too much to ask, for even if 
the indulgence were granted, the challenger 
must still be in the unfavorable position of be¬ 
ing required to build a yacht to a rule totally 
unfamiliar to European designers, and to sail 
her in waters very familiar to the defenders, 
but not to his own skipper and crew. Surely 
this should be a sufficient protection for the 
New York Club’s piece de resistance.” 
These continued criticisms of the New York 
Y. C. for declining to arrange a race must be 
very annoying to those members of the club 
who stand for good sport and who wish to 
arrange a fair race with any foreign yachtsman 
for the possession of the cup. They must 
accept these and other caustic remarks as long 
as they permit a few members of their club to 
put every obstacle in the way of a race. Yacht¬ 
ing has always been regarded as one of the 
very few sports that is free from politics, and 
those men who take part in it have usually 
been yachtsmen for sport’s sake only. The 
America’s Cup is a trophy offered for the en¬ 
couragement of international sport, and instead 
of the club holding the cup trying to shirk 
races it should do what it can to encourage 
them and not hedge the cup about with con¬ 
ditions that make it impossible for a foreign 
yachtsman to compete because he knows that 
his yacht is beaten before it leaves the other 
side. 
The Yachting World says: “It is neither sur¬ 
prising nor regretful that the discussion of the 
possibility of a resumption of the America’s 
Cup contest should again be raised at this sea¬ 
son. In holding this opinion we are by no 
means forgetful of the fact that the matter has 
already been argued and re-argued, threshed 
till every grain of satisfaction which it can be 
made to yield has been discovered, and until 
we are practically convinced that no good can 
be expected from any further consideration of 
the Points involved. It has been admitted on 
our behalf that we were over-confident of our 
own powers when we accepted the conditions 
originally attached to the contest, and that it 
has only been this same inability to realize 
when we are beaten that has kept us stubbornly 
continuing the contest, while every step in the 
development of the racers made the handicap 
under which we labored more and more 
serious. It is now quite a long time since we 
eac J le c an( f made known the conviction that it 
would be unfair to our representative yachts¬ 
men and to the reputation of our designers and 
skippers to go further in a contest burdened 
with conditions which left us at so serious a 
iisadvantage. 
“Nothing has occurred in the interval to 
cause us to alter this opinion, and it may then 
be pertinently asked why the revival of the 
talk of America’s Cup challenging should he re¬ 
garded with any kind of satisfaction. The rea¬ 
son is plain enough for all to read. However 
futile the discussion may be, the revival can at 
least be accepted as another proof that our 
sporting spirit is as sound and as widespread 
as ever, and that we are still loth to drop the 
contest without tasting the victory for which 
we have fought so long. The question as to 
whether this revival of the discussion is doomed 
to the same futile ending as those which have 
immediately preceded it might be worthy of 
discussion if the opportunity served. There 
are many doubts to be encountered and many 
difficulties of a serious kind to be solved, but 
even in the face of these it would be an error 
of serious kind to regard this latest effort as 
necessarily doomed to failure. There are in¬ 
fluences at work which have not been available 
in recent, efforts to get the contest out upon a 
more. satisfactory basis and it is early yet to 
despair of their chances of proving successful. 
, the meantime, however, a new element is 
introduced, or rather an old one is brought 
again to the front in a suggestion that this 
trophy should be dropped from the sporting 
list, and that there should be instituted another 
America’s Cup which could be held and raced 
for without any of the vexatious restrictions 
which have proved a constant discouragement 
to this, phase of international sport. The 
matter is put in a straightforward question as 
to whether it is not possible to institute a new 
America’s Cup. Our opinion may be given in 
a straightforward answer, that it is not. It 
would be the easiest thing in the world to pro¬ 
vide a trophy for international racing infinitely 
superior to that which was originally captured 
by the schooner America. It is done every 
season. Equally easy would it be to mark a 
special trophy with a condition that it be held 
open to international challenge. That also has 
been done, and the result has been that the 
trophy has lain tarnishing for lack of compe¬ 
tition and has at length had to be thrown back 
into open competition in the hope of raising a 
new interest. The only value the America’s Cup 
has lies, in the strenuous half-century of fight¬ 
ing which has centered in it. These associa¬ 
tions cannot be transferred to any other trophy 
They belong to the America’s Cup alone, and 
our anxiety for the success of the latest negoti¬ 
ations is due to the fact that with the with¬ 
drawal of the America’s Cup these associations 
and the spirit which they have engendered 
would be lost to the sport.” 
Long Distance Power Boat Races. 
Three long distance power boat races are 
already assured for next season, and these will 
bring out three different types of vessels. One 
is for vessels under 40 feet, one for those under 
60 feet and the third for those not less than 
50 feet and not over 100 feet in length. 
The races for the small class will be from 
Marblehead to New York, finishing off the 
Crescent Athletic Club at Bay Ridge. This 
race has grown wonderfully in popularity, and 
has always attracted well. It is a fixture in the 
schedule of races and the conditions which 
have been changed from time to time are now 
such that they are fair to all and give little op¬ 
portunity for cheating on the horsepower of 
the motors,, which has been so frequent when 
races of this kind have been arranged. The 
rule to determine horsepower will be the 190Q 
rule of the American Power Boat Association, 
which takes into consideration the area and 
number of pistons and disregards the number 
of revolutions. It was this factor that caused 
so much trouble and motor builders to do 
all sorts of things to keep this number as small 
as possible in order to benefit in rating. This 
rule has had a season’s trial, and it has been 
found to work so well that there is little likeli¬ 
hood of its being changed. 
I his year the Marblehead race was started 
from Bay Ridge, and the finish was off the 
Eastern Y. C. house at Marblehead. Some 
objections were made when the outside course 
was selected, but after a fair trial yachtsmen 
have expressed, themselves as well pleased with 
it. The race is one to develop boats having 
Weatherly qualities, and it seems only right to 
those in charge of the affair that the test 
should be over an outside course. The first 
few races either started or finished in Long 
Island Sound, and the only outside work was 
going over the shoals. The racers have to go 
oyer these shoals whether they go through the 
Sound or not, and if they can successfully go 
over the shoals and around the Cape, their 
owners should not fear continuing the course 
on along the south side of Long Island, where 
there are many harbors to put in in case of 
very bad weather. 
The longest race will be that from Philadel¬ 
phia to Havana. This course is 1,400 miles 
and will take the yachts by Cape Hatteras and 
along the American coast down past Florida 
and then across the straits to Havana. A boat 
of sound type and good size is necessary for 
such a race, and a good boat should be de¬ 
veloped within the limitations placed by the 
promoters of the contest. The date for this 
race has not yet been fixed, but it will in all 
probability be early in the season. 
Some reports have been circulated that this 
race to Havana is to take the place of the 
power boat race to Bermuda. This is an error, 
rile Bermuda race is a fixture. It is growing 
m popularity and will take place as usual, but 
probably the date will be made a little later 
than it was this year, the first week in June, in 
order that those owners whose yachts take p’art 
m the Havana race and are eligible to com¬ 
pete in the Bermuda race may be able to take 
part in both events. The race to Bermuda is 
for power boats under 60 feet in length. The 
restiictions call for a well constructed vessel 
and one that can withstand the storms likely 
to be met on that trip. There are several 
yachts that can enter for this contest, and the 
size, 60 feet, is a popular one, and special 
efforts will be made this year to get a good 
sized fleet to start from the Lower Bay. 
Laid Up at Tebo’s. 
These yachts are laid up at Tebo’s Basin 
South Brooklyn: 
Steamers and Auxiliaries.—Aquilo, W. P. 
Eno; Elreba, Henry Darlington; Wanderer H 
A. C. Taylor; Virginia, Isaac Stern; Celt, I.’ 
Rogers Maxwell; Nearia, Charles A. Gould; 
Sappho, J. A. Alexandre; Carmina, Joseph E 
Fletcher; Arrow, Edward F. Whitney; Kismet, 
Francis S. Smithers; Reviera, Frederick Galla¬ 
tin; Oneida, E. C. Benedict; Nushka, Joseph 
Hoadley, Enieline, Charles Sweeney* 
Alcyone, Henry W. Putnam; Wild Duck, Paul 
E. de Fere; Enterprise, auxiliary brig; Genesse, 
James Sibley Watson; Duchess, estate of L j’ 
Busby; Osceola, Mrs. Julia Curtiss; Nyora J 
F. Lisman; Margaret, Isaac E. Emerson; 
Kobin, I. L. Chadbourne, Jr., Iroquois, Max 
A. Mosle. 
Power Boats.—Senta, John A. Fish; Mous- 
quetaire, Paul E. de Fere, and the Saranac. 
Schooners.—Queen, J. Rogers Maxwell, and 
the Onward. 
House Boats.—Buccaneer and Savanilla. 
