The daily morning journal and courier., 1899-10-04

| tefmlned this year that the course
 should be protected against unofficial
 trespassers A flotilla of revenue cut l ters and swift torpedo boats, flying the
 red barred white flags, guarded the
 course, keeping excursion steamers yachts and tugs at a perfectly safe dis
 tance from the canvas clouded racers. | Excursion Boats Fenced Of1.
 On the way down they maintained two parallel lines, a mile apart, two line fences, through which none of the pushing, crowdirg fleet of excursion
 vessels was permitted to poke her nose. The broad, expansive sea inside, with
 out wash or swell, was left clear and
 free for the manoeuvring of the yachts. On the way back the patrol vessels were
 were equally efficient. When the yachts
 were on the starboard tack the torpedo
 boats were in column on the same course
 and the revenue cutters abreast, behind
 the yachts, thus forming a right angle
 in the hollow of which the yachts sailed without embarrassment. When the | yachts changed course each vessel of
 the patrol fleet changed with it, simply altering the direction of the vessels and | keeping the excursion boats fenced off. It was only toward the close, when the l hope of finishing the race was given up. that the excursion boats crowded about | the end of the patrol lines, many of them making straight for home.
 | The Race.
 l The course was laid fifteen miles dead
 before the wind and back again. The | direction Of the wind carried this course
 south southwest from the Sandy Hook lightship almost straight down the Jer- sey coast to point off Asbury Park, where the white float with a red ball was placed to mark the turning point. The Columbia was admirably handled throughout the race. Though the Shamrock was first across the line by forty-three seconds, the Columbia's Deer Isle crew of Yankees, wearing their picturesque watch caps in Iselin's col ors, were so much handler than their Scotch rivals that they had the Colum- bias spinnaker and balloon jib set first by three minutes The spectators mar veled at the cloud of canvas the big levithians carried. Straight up into the air the sky-scraping yards carried the point of the pyramids of canvas for 175 feet It is hard to realize that this means the heighth of an ordinary twelve-story building, and that the frail hulls were bowling along under the pres- sure of 14,OO0 feet of canvas.
 Shamrock Forges Ahead.
 The twin balloons with their following wind lifted the Columbia along like great gull in the ten-knot breeze and carried her in ten minutes past the Shamrock. But when the wind died to six knots, as it did within a few min utes, the Shamrock forged steadily ahead until at the end of forty-five min- utes she led by 200 yards. Then a sud den haul of the wind to the north-north west reached the Columbia first. The big-bellied spinnaker was taken in, her mainsail was smartly gybed and she passed the Shamrock as if the latter had been moored to her wharf. Instead of a run the canting of the wind now made it a reach for the outer mark, but the Columbia gradually edged over toward | the Jersey coast with the intention of | getting the wind astern and running 1 straight before it. The manoeuvre was accomplished after cross | ing the Shamrock's bow, but just as the | spinnaker was set aboard the Columbia | the wind canted back to the north northeast and left her with her cloud | of canvas shivering like collapsed bal loon. The Shamrock had started to fol- low the Columbia's tactics Twice she | lowered her spnnaker boom as if to 1 break out the big sail, but as the wind held from the new quarter she gybed her main boom instead and reached straight for the mark.
 Columbin's Costly Manoeuvrc.
 Although tn manoeuvre of the Colum bia had been successful, it was a cost |y one and she lost several minutes by holding on to her immense canvas in the vain hope that the wind would shift back again. But when she did change her sails, she made up for lost time by ,utfooting her antagonist. She seemed to skim over the watre, scarcely mak- Ing a ripple where she entered it and leaving a wake of foam behind her. The Shamrock made more fuss forward md dragged a wave aft. The Colum- oa was first to the mark and as she 'ounded the stake boat the excursion feet gathered there to greet her
 Unnbntrd Enthusiasm.
 They unbottled their enthusiasm and rave her ovation from a thousand whistles The fleet saluted the Sham ock also as she swept around, two minutes and one second later. On the peat home against head wind the Co., umbia showed her heels to the Irish ,oat unmistakably while the wind held. Time after time the Shamrock tried for he weather gauge, luffing, squeezing | lnd pinching until her head sails trem ,led but without avail. The Columbia lot only held as high, but outfooted her ack after tack, The yachts made a ,eautiful spectacle as they beat to heeling over to the breeze, he water sliding swiftly back from heir shark-like bows. Whenever they ] .ot into an unusually high sea the pray went twenty feet into the air $
 The Finish. l The Columbia had got mile ahead ! nd the yachts were away over under l he Jersey shore, the breeze again half l ailed and the Shamrock drew gradual l y ahead. It was marvellous that in so : ght a breeze a boat could slip SD t wiftly through the sea- After that the E hamrock was never headed, but from 7ht time to the finish the Columbia V ad nothing but bad luck. In addition e