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6 THE MARINE RECORD. AUXILIARY SAILS, Lockrorr, December 29. To the Editor of the Marine Record: There is only one best course in a light wind (at least of a speed of ten miles an hour,) that salle, us auxiliary to steam, can aid the steam power, and thatis with wind forward of the beam, On all courses abaft the beam» with the steam speed faster than that of the wind,the wind can have no effect on the sails, from the fact that the steam power bas taken the eails away from the wind. <A vessel sailing to windward with the wind torward of the beam, up to an angle of forty-five de- grees, the steam speed does not take the sails away from the wind. On the contrary, it increases the power of the wind on the sails, and increases the speed of the vessel, the same as in beating up with the ourrent, There are times with the wind abaft the beam and b’owing at a velocity of thirty or forty miles an hour, when the steam power can be dispensed with, that is, if. the vessel has spars, rigging, and enils strong enough to meet its force; uleo if the vessels form is such that her momentum can not be checked by diving into a wave. If allies right the steam, at such times, acts as an auxiliary to the sails. from the fact that the motion it imparts to the veesel enables the suile to be set without splitting. ‘The motion from the steam power decreases the power of the wind on the sails when running before it, or partially so. The sails once set and the speed of the vessel so increased as not to need the steam, if all is then right so that the steam can be shut off, the speed can be kept up without it. A cage in point: The steamer that I built in 1854, with ull of her details right for such work, could run at a speed ot ten miles an hour by steam alone. She had one large sall only. We had started out ina heavy gale. Before starting we had put on her mast, *‘preventer braces”? and cet her suil. The wind was on her quarter, the gale was a severe one and the lake unusually rough. In a short time the engineer came on deck and reported that the speed was 60 great that it was running the steam all off, and that he could not keep it up. The captain ordered him to throw the wheels out of gear and shut off his steam. He did so, and we ran our course at the rate of cighteen miles an hour with sail only. Levy Rowley, her captain, was un experienced sea captain, and remarked of this passage that there was not a vessel in the world that could have made it in the time that she had, and gave his rea- sons,as follows: ‘That’ any other vessel would have rolled and pitched so much that it would have destroyed the efficiency of the sails, and that no other vessel could have used whole snile, as they would have been tuken out of the bolt ropes at the first, be- fore she could have gained momentum, We did not use her sail except in high, sharp winds, and this was the only trip we made with her without steam. As has been said above, the most valuable auxiliary sails will be setona windward course at an angle of forty-five degrees from the wind. If all is right sails can be set.on this course 60 as to muke great speed and use no steam, or rudder, as the vessel can not vary from it. I now have before me an illustration of a vessel in which allis right to set sails so as to hold such acourse, [n practice with such a vessel, she will steam up to her best speed on that course, with her snils set, then, if her speed bas increased so as to be 80 great that the steam power cannot keep up with it, the steam can be shut off. The vessel I have before me has four independ- ent steam powers, which can be shut off, one at atime, as the exigency at the time may require, ‘I'o get perfect sailing, not only the hull of the vessel must be right for it, but pure principles of sailing must be taken ad- vantage of, There is a maxim that when the eall has been set right, that in order to get the best speed the position of the sail must not be changed. A rolling, diving motion of a vessel changes the surface of the sails in such a manner as not to be effective. The motion ot the hull of a vessel should be as near the motion of an ice boat on smooth ice as possible, The illustration that I now have before me comes as near the ice boat motion as it is possible, It does not roll, nor does it pitch in rough water, and It does not careen. The ice boat runs on an unyielding anrface, and its stability depends upon the distance between its runnere. The further the runner is from the mast the greater the stability. The reason why the ice boat so Instantly moves ahead on the wind is that resistance to sail pressure is positive, There is no least resistance. On the contrary, in a vessel there ls a least resistance, and the vessel rolls down until she finds a positive before she moves ahead. ‘This positive is a quantity of buoyancy, and the vessel rolle down until she finds it. The satety ship has her buoyancy 80 lovated that there is but the least. possible resistance to overcome be- fore she finds a posit've to move her ahead. ‘The advantage of this is two-told, One is, the surface of the anil can not change; the other is that there is no lost motion by roll- ing to find a positive resistance. As vessels are now formed and rigged, in high wind and rough water, beating to windward, they do not get one-half the speed that the wind would give them if all was right to enable them.to do so. In fact, when it blowsa gale they can not be gailed to windward, but must lay-to. It is not uncommon for a ship to lay-to two or three weeks ata time. (The ship Ellen Munro, on her passige from Boston to Sen Francisco, lay-to outside of Cape Cod over three days, and over twenty days off Cape Horn.) Nor can they be sailed in’ the troughs of the waves. For vessels such a8’ the illustration now before me, clothed with buoyancy, as long as sail can stand they need not lay-to. Under motion, with strong sails and sailing on any course, they can carry sail in an excessive high wind, and are steady and at home especially in the troughs of the waves. The first buoyant-clothed boat that I built was in 1848, She war twenty-four feet long and ten teet wide. Probably no bout ever built won the reputation that beat did. She was the lightest I ever saw ofher size. Her performances for the ten years that she was used were most wonderful. I will only give one, as space will not admit of more. The boat was sloop-rigged, and for heavy weather use she had small, strong sails and a small hickory mast with only head stay. ‘The in- cident was in one of the mid summer hurri- canes which sweep everything before it. One of the sail boate, having on board ladies belonging to the South Bay House, had been driven out into the luke betore the tempest. I reefed down to the third reef the Experi- ment (boat’s name,) and flew before the storm. ‘fhe only guide was the wind, so furious was the storm and rain that notning wae vi-ible over a few rods distant. Frencb- man’s Upper Island was directly to leeward. LT thought the boat might be driven on it. I ran the length of it, but they were not there, I then ran around to the lee side of the is- land and met one of the ablest yachts of the luke, sailed by an able seacaptain. He had found the missing yacht, which was also sailed by a sea captain, anchored in a cove under the lee vf the island. The question then was for us to get back againat the storm. I believed that I could do so, Captuin Rowley, who sailed the other boat, was the last one to’ back out, and we started. When we had rounded the island we were in the direct open surge of the lake, and it was a reugh one, ‘The captain’s craft rolled and tumbled badly, when we hauled our wind, and made but little headway. The Experiment shot away from her like a dart and was out of sight of her in a few mo- ments, We flew to windward apparently in the ‘‘wind’s eye.”?’ Home was about three miles distant. We etood on our course, as nearly as we could judge, about fifteen min- utex, and then went about 80 28 to reach the south shore, and know where we were. To our astonishment we found that we were to windwar.l ot our whart, had got home. The storm raged aboutthree hours. ‘The captain got in about two hours after we did. He reported that for about one and a half hours he just held his own. He was a whaler, and a rough one, and he said he thought that was doing d—— well, and 1t was, in such a storm and rough time. This boat was the first crude one on the buoyancy-clothed principle. A brief description of her possi- bly may be of interest to your readers, As I have said above, she probably was the lightest boat of her size ever built, and used no ballast, She was ten feet wide on deck, but at her water line only eix teet. She was not flat. On the contrary, she had ‘sharp dead rise,’ and depended for stubility entirely upon her sealed-in buoyancy. In sailing trim she was only six inches above the water, and offered but small resistance to the wind. She proved herself a storm bird in more than 100 storms in her lifetime, and settled the question beyond dispute that the wind can be utilized in its wildest mooda, and to the best advantage. But she had not a moity of safety principle in her, as bas the one I built, in 1874, his one is life under all circumstances, as long as she is afloat. Twice has this one been struck with tem pests directly on a lee shore, £0 near, in one, that she struck the rocks, In both cases with her sails only and no one at the tiller, she dashed through the wild waves away from the shore to windward. ‘This is along digression from the subject in hand, but it seemed to come in here naturally on the principle that “from little acorns great onks grow.’? We wall now resume the sub- ject of auxiliary saile, the future propulsion, A sailor dreads both a gale and a calm, but with auxiliary propulsion the gale will be welcome and the calm no longer dreaded, and the time of a passage decreased at least fifty per cent. I did not intend in this to say anything about the form of the hull of the safety chip, but the principle of sailing has so close a relation to the principles ot the hull that I find tt difficult to apeas of one withoutreferring to the other, In run- ning before the wind with the aufety ship it can not blow too bard for the sulle, if she ceun keep up her motion, And to make great speed she must move faster than the waves, If an ordinary vessel does this, after she has mounted a wave and pitched over she makes a rapid descent and rans her bow into the next wave, which checks her mo+ tion, and if ehe has large sall set it is liable to be split at that time. Swift and steady motion Is safety to the sall. The form of the new ship is such that she can not have her motion checked. She cuts a _plece out of the wave and her ploughs undermine it and gravity levels It, and the vessel hus to do no climbing. ‘The most. valuable work the auxi'iary sails do is when the course of the wind Isat, or near, an angle of forty-five degrees from the wind with her sails set for, it. It is impossible for her to change from her course, and ber steadiness is stich that she can carry large sails,and with them and her steam get an unprecedented speed. The illustration spoken of above hus in it five, short, strong masts. One of the tore masts stands on her weatherside one-fourth of her length from the stem. Her main mast isat her center, exactly amidship. One of her mizzen musts is on her lee quarter. One of her bowsprite ison her weather side, and hinged near the foot of her. weather fore mast, and cnn be set at any desired angle. The jib, when set, is at an angle close ou the wind, which just places its. leach to windward of the luff of her weather fore sail, so. that the wind can spill from the jib into the fore sail, ‘The tore sail is so set that the wind can pass from it at the luff of the main cail-in the same plane as the jib. The main sail is set in the same plane and passes its wind into the mizzen sui] atits luff. This combination gives a plane of sail neaily the whole length of the vessel, and as high as practicable, probably about one-fourth her length. All the wind the vessel meets can be utilized, with this combination, to the best possible advantage. In running with this combination only it would need «a man at the wheel, the same as any other vessel, but the sail is co equalized that there igs nu danger of broaching or griping. If it is de- sirous to put her on this course without a man at the wheel, then her weather mizzen sail must be set (her fore and mizzen masts are opposite eavh other.) With that set she cin not change trom her course. She has seven working suils, and they can ail be set on.this course, ‘They are all handled on deck. Often there are long times of light winds and calms,when snils will not be needed, or be of any tse, The arrangement of the sails is such that they can be bent, or unbent, nealy as quick as they can be furied, or un- furled, and can be put under cover, No man can question the need or desire fox the advantages that I have pointed out above, whatever he may say about the possi- bility to attain them, und I make the asser- tion here that all the pvints have been proved by practical use, also that it will take but a short time to prove this truth, if Congress will appoint a board of scientists, of known science, toexamine the theories and eee just what relation science has to them, and alo see just what relation science has to naval architecture as now practiced. Yours truly, JosErH W. Norcross. BUTLER’S PIRATE SCHOONER. In 1881 an American whaler, heavily Ja den with sea elephant oi] and South Sea Island seul skins, was working her way fromthe islands of the Antarctic ocean, bound home. ‘The trip had been very suc- cessful, and the vessel was laden with a val- uable cargo. When near Desolation Island a hurricane was encountered, and in spite of every effort to save her, the vessel was driven into the breakers of Deeolation Island, her masts were carried away anda portion of her crew washed overboard and drowned. Several ot the crew, however, including the captain, John Hasmond, and the colored steward, clung to the wreck, and as goon as the sea had abated somewhat attempted to land on the island in one of the sbip’s boats. ‘The attempt proved disas- trous, the boat being dashed on the heavy boulders lining the shore, and but two men, Captain Easmond and the steward, P M. Olsen, of Baltimore, succeeded tn landing. These two men, cast ashore on a desolate island, subsisted for several months on wild birde, which they killed with stones; and eggs, with which the island was covered. In the meantime, the wrecked vessel held together, and with every succeeding gale was washed further on the ehore, so that at ordinary times she lay quite high and dry. Months afterward a whaling vessel hove to off the island, searching for treah water, and discovered the castaways. ‘Their story was soon told, and when the ship sailed she car- ried away as passengers the shipwrecked mariners, ‘They arrived in this city, and in telling the story of the wrozk of their vessel, also stated that her cargo was intact,in good condition, and could easily be secured, Cap tain Robert Tarr,of Gloucester, heard of their adventures, and, together with General Ben- jamin F. Butler, decided to make an attempt to secure the epoils. On August 12th con- siderable excitement was caused in Halifax, N.&., by the statement there made, and widely telegraphed over the United States and Canada, that the schooner Conquest, bad been purebased by parties frem the United States, and was to be used for, as “as then stuted, piratical purposes, fe was then asserted, and not denied, that the schooner was purchased by Robert-‘Tarr, of Glouces- ter, and Bepjamin F. Butler, of Lowell, und what these two well known politicians could want with an old schooner formed a good foundation for stories by gossipers throughout the country. It now appears that the schooner was purchased by these gentlemen for the purpose of seeking and recuring the abandoned cargo of this South Sea whaler,, ashore on Desolation Island. The schooner sailed from Halifax, Auguat 15, 1882, with orders to call at Cape Town and wire her arrival, From the time she sailed from Halifax up to now, not a word has been heard from her, and she has been given up tur lost. Her commander was the rescued cuptuin of the lost whaler, Joha Easmond, hailing from South Boston, and, her crew list: comprised the following ;. Will- jam Hilchey, Halttax, first mate; Fred Hilchey, Halifax, second mate;. Joseph Matthews, Hulifax, cooper; P. M. Oleen, cook; James Spicer, John Carigan, James Deady, Jolin Surcell,, David Frasor, Ed- mund Little, and P, Byrnes, seamen, all of Halifux.—Boston Globe. a A CANAL PROJECT. During the year that Congressman Carle- ton was mayor of Port Huron,the feasibility of a scheme to construct a canal from the shore of Lake Huron, between Huronia Beach and Brighton Beach, to Black River, near the race of the old Harrington mill, was discussed in the Times. ‘he project bas lately been revived, and eftorts will be made to secure the constructioh of the pro- posed canal, Those who have considered the proposi- tion concede that general navigation and also the city, would be greatly benefited by the canal. Vessel and lumber men now ex- perience great delay and often serious loss during storms when they are on Lake Hu- ron snc desire to enter St. Clair river. Rafts of logs have been broken up and lost and vessels damaged ini trying to reach the river during a violent gale, and the marine inter- ests have long felt the need of an improve- ment that would afford protection at such times. The cutting of a canal, as proposed, it is believed, would afford ample protection und expedite navigation. Engineers consid- er the scheme feasible and one that would not require an extravagant expenditure of money. A breakwater would also have to be constructed in Luke Huron, forming a bay that would be an excellent harbor for vessels, . The grade is reported to be sufficient. to cause un easy current, which would be a great improvement over the laborious work of pulling through the rapids at the head of St. Clair river, und vessels would be able to make more rapid transit. ‘The current would also be strong enough to make Black river a desirable stream to carry off the sewage of the city, and the building of sew- ers to empty into Black river would not be as expensive as if they were laid to St.Clair river. But one of the most important benefits that Port Huron would derive trom the ca- nal, would undoubtedly be the opening up of Black river above the Seventh street bridye to many manufactories. Salt blocks and car shops are probable industies that will, in the near tuture, be located.on the river, and with sate navigation their estab- lishment might be advanced. ‘To secure the construction of the canal it is proposed that an appropriation be made by the State, and that Congress be asked to make an appropriation for building the breakwater. Congressman Carleton and other citizens have interested themselves in the scheme for the past three years, and when the proper time comes Mr, Carleton can be relied upon to use his influence in Congress to obtain the necessary appropria- tion. Considerable attent‘on will probably be devoted to the canal project at the next session of Congrese, and its warmest advo- cates hope that it will be successful.—Port Huron Times. — FRAILYY OF BRITISH TONNAGE, Attention was recently drawn in Kingland to the loss of life among British sailors; it being stated that cauealties occur to nearly three thousand vessels yearly involving the drowning of at least as many seamen, The chiet cause of this, itis elaimed, Is to be found in the vessel itself which as at present conatructed presents many vulnerable points and for that reason stands a great chance of destruction in case of acollision, It does not seem right that this should be so, and if the facts in the case justify the complaint as regards the general frailty of vessels, it would appear that either the requirements of underwriters have not strictly been lived up to, or else those requirements are not adequate to the necessities of the present age. No vessel, to be sure, is practically unsinkable, but it is hardly tobe supposed that all vessels are generally s0 poorly con- structed as to justify such wholesale condem- nation as the above — statement seems to imply.— Trade Reporter.