Project Gutenberg's Harper's Young People, August 24, 1880, by Various

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Title: Harper's Young People, August 24, 1880
An Illustrated Weekly

Author: Various

Release Date: June 13, 2009 [EBook #29108]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE, AUG 24, 1880 ***

Produced by Annie McGuire

[Illustration: HARPER'S

YOUNG PEOPLE

AN ILLUSTRATED WEEKLY.]

* * * * *

VOL. I.--NO. 43. PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK. PRICE FOUR
CENTS.

Tuesday, August 24, 1880. Copyright, 1880, by HARPER & BROTHERS. $1.50
per Year, in Advance.

* * * * *

[Illustration]

SOME QUEER RACING-CRAFT.

The illustrations on this page are of two varieties of sail-boats that
are very common in the vicinity of New York, and quite rare in other
parts of the country. They are boats built expressly for speed, and are
used almost entirely for racing.

The upper of the two pictures represents a regatta of swift sailing
craft that, as can be readily seen, would be totally unfit for a cruise
of any length, nor would they be of much use in ordinary
pleasure-sailing. They are very light of draught, have no cabin, are
apparently very much oversparred, and carry sails out of all proportion
to their size. Most of them are sloop-rigged, and the main-booms are so
long that, in order to control the sail at all, the main-sheet is
trimmed from the end of a platform that overhangs the stern of the
boat. Out on this is seated a skillful boatman, whose whole attention is
given to the main-sheet.

These boats have very large centre-boards, and in races carry crews of
from twelve to twenty men, whose duty it is to shift from side to side
the many sand-bags that are carried as ballast. Extraordinary speed is
made by these boats, and thousands of dollars are often wagered on races
between two or more of them.

Some of them have become so famous for speed that their names are seen
in the papers almost as often as those of noted race-horses. Among these
famous boats are the _Susie S._, _Brown_, _Nettle_, _Martha M._,
_Dare-Dev