The Republican journal., 1907-04-18
ness.
LIBRARY HAS FIGUREHEAD.

LIBRARY AS fICTl REH FAD.
Only few years ago the bark Rous-
seau, built in 1901, was broken up and
her figurehead placed in the New Bed
ford public library, while the bark
George and Susan, 1910, the ship Mil
ton, 1915, and others launched while
the century was yet in it's teens, but
recently went out of commission. The
bark Canton, built in 1885 at Baltimore,
is the oldest survivor of the whaling
feet.
For various reasons, however, such
wooden vessels as are built in this
country of late years will be by no
means as long-lived as the old ones.
Their great size is unfavorable to dur
ability, it being impossible to construct
large vessels proportionately as strong
ly as small ones. Aside from this fact,
the material used nowadays is, as a
rule, inferior.
Nearly all the oak for shipbuilding is
now brought from the south and west
and compares with the best quality of
the now rare New England white oak
much as common newspaper does with
fine linen note paper. Both are white
paper, and SO both may be white oak,
but there is vast difference in their
b, Probably the best built big wooden
fore-and after now atloat is the four
master Mary L. Newhall, launched at
New England live oak, which had lain
in salt water at the kittery navy yard
for 40 years.
The old practice of sailing new YES
sells added greatly to their longevity,
but is now almost unheard Of In this
connection it is interesting to learn
that the custom originated on Lake
Ontario, where for many years a traffic
in salt was carried on between Oswego
and Niagara. The vessels employed
were often built of poorly seasoned
material, yet it was noticed that they
escaped decay for many years longer
than others.
Accordingly, when in 1908 the govern
ment built the brig Oneida of 240 tons
upon this lake, all open space between
the ceiling and planking was packed
with salt. Though the timber was cut
in the forest and set up in the vessels
frame within the month, the brig lasted
for many years, in 1918 forming one of
the squadron with which Commodore
Chauncey chased Sir James Yeo about
these waters.
The short time occupied in her con-
struction is cited as remarkable, yet in
1915 the privateer brig Avon OF 3Ss tons
was ratified together in Medford, Mass,
in 26 days.
Probably two-thirds of the wooden
vessels built on this coast in late years
are employed in the coasting coal and
ice trades Both cargoes generate
steam in the vessels hold and thus
hasten decay.
Simply from exposure to rain and
snow the decks and sides will common
ly become badly decayed, while that
portion of the vessel which is always
under salt water remains almost per-
feet. 1t is no rare thing to find craft
which has been twice or even three
times ''restopped," while still retaining
the original timber in her bottom.
POETRY OUT OF THE BUSINESS.
Yet from either an artistic or senti-
mental standpoint, the thought that the
and ix-masted schooners will be COM
paratively short lived is far from har-
rowing. A rig consisting of six bare
ging set up with iron turnbuckles, and
hull destitute of figurehead, or, in
deed, of any carving worthy of the
name; with steam engines on deck to
hoist the sails, weigh anchor, pump
ship, ETC., constitutes style of craft
from which the "poetry of the sea" has
been pretty thoroughly eliminated.
The shanties of the sailors have been
superseded by the putting of the donkey
engine, while the marline-spike has Civ
en- way to the monkey wrench and Oil
can.
And in the matter of names modern
vessels have in this country at least for
most part ceased to become intures ing.
In looking over the shipping colu INNS
may be noticed the arrivals of the e reat
five and six-masted schooners John F.
Brown and E. Augustus Stubs, each
freighted with 1000 and 5000 tons of
coal, loaded and to be discharged by
steam, but nothing further is suggest
ed, unless it be coal dust and the smell
of hot oil.
But when the old-fashioned bluff
bowed brig Heart of Oak comes into
port from some far distant land, how
easy to picture the gallant little craft
hove to at sea in a winters gale, with
part Of her sails blown away and en-
crusted with ice, but shaking her sturdy
little self out of the seas like duck,
and making such fight for life as is
simply impossible to conceive the great
overgrown, wobble-jointed E. Augustus
Stubs capable of doing.