The San Francisco call., 1896-05-12
ALONG THE WATER FRONT
The Arrival Of the New, Stanch
Puget Sound Schooner
Affair.
BUILT FOR SPEED AND WEAR.
Continued Troubles of Count and
Countess Festetics in the
South Seas.
BUILT FOR SPEED AND WEAR.

The Puget Sound schooner Affair came
down from Port Costa Sunday and now
lies at the Green-street wharf. This little
Cotton vessel is a most remarkable craft
She was built near Port Townsend last
February for a sealer and hunter in north
ern coasts, and was designed to withstand
the hard knocks of those stormy waters.
Human skill could hardly put together
a wooden hull more stanch and on lines
more graceful than this star-named
schooner. Her ribs are nine by ten inches
square and stand ten inches apart. The
planking of the hull is five inches thick
and the stem and keel are joined together
with natural crook, just as it grew in
the tree. There are nine feet of dead
wood in the bow. making the little, white,
peaceful craft warlike ram.
Her length is 66 feet at the keel and so
feet over all, her beam 81 feet and her
draught when loaded is feet. Her bows
are very sharp for great speed, and her
lines widen out to her greatest beam amid
ships. She is not Turneresque. with q
broad quarter, but falls in to a smaller
beam at the stern. Her mainsail hoist is
about 54 feet, and she spreads 1000 square
yards Of canvas. She is fitted with mod
around on her keel like top. The Affair
is owned by r. Olsen of this City, by whom
she is valued at $1,000.
She left Port Townsend April 26, and off
Cape Flattery she caught a fierce south
easter, which tossed the little white
schooner on the crests of the great billows
like cork. As the gale was dead ahead
for her course she lay under a reefed lore
sail for nine days. So weatherly Is she
that her decks were never washed by the
seas and her beam kept her as upright as
a church.
On the tenth day the gale veered to the
northwest, and then she gathered up her
yachtlike heels and flew. Fourteen and
sixteen knots under short sail was her
speed till the storm blew itself away.
Scudding before living gale is a trial to
the wheelsman, but the Affairs steering
machine never let the sharp stem vary an
inch from the straight-away course.
She discharged her cargo of lumber at
Port Costa and is now preparing for
cruise along the Mexican coast.
Australia is indeed necessity, or at least
she is the mother of invention, for she has
sent the world another useful appliance
which If not as important as the ballot
system anu the horse race starting tape,
merits a trial. 1t is an automatic machine
for registering the finish of running, SWIM
ming and bicycle races and is the property
" n. q
arrived ON the Monowai last Sunday. The
machine is suspended over the finishing
point of the course and records without
error not only the time but the order of
the finishes and the distances the CON-
p-titors are apart at the ending OF the
race.
Mr.. Baird is member of the council of
the New South Wales Athletic Association
and of several bicycle clubs in SYDNEY.
His finishing machine is used at every
sports meeting of any Importance in Aus
tralia.
By the passengers of the Monowai it is
reported that the Count and Countess Fes-
tetics, in their yacht Tolna, were still sail
ing in stormy seas. Ever since the luck
less pair in their luckless vessel left San
Francisco a couple of years ago thew have
been in trouble. Crew after crew have been
shipped only TO jump the yacht at the first
port, and much of the time the vessel has
been deserted in some island harbor ex-
cept by its captainess and her spouse. Ac-
cording to the complaints of the men she
carried the keys of the storeroom at her
belt and fed them on han dtack and water.
When the Monowai left Sydney the
Tolna had secured a new crew and was
getting under way for a cruise. The
Countess had promised to let the steward
feed the crew and she would only attend
to the Counts rations.
Yesterday the schooner Moonlight Cap-
tain Spencer, sailed on trading and
prospecting voyage on the Mexican coast.
Admiral Angelo o. Monesterio of the
by the Consul l-General of Mexico, officially
visited the Custom-house yesterday, The
admiral was in full uniform and was re-
ceiyed with ceremony suitable tn his rank