Boat Sailing in Fair Weather and Foul, 6th ed.

by A. J. Kenealy

Fashionable craft with spoon bows and long overhangs forward have abolished the long bowsprits and simplified the head gear. The short bowsprit is secured with a steel bobstay extending from the stem to the cranze iron on the bowsprit, the bobstay being set up taut with a turnbuckle of galvanized iron. The bowsprit shrouds are of steel wire also set up by turnbuckles.

The polemast has also done away with all the topmast gear, the mast being secured by a forestay which sets up to the stem head and by one or sometimes two shrouds on each side set up by turnbuckles. The days of deadeyes and lanyards and of reefing bowsprits are departed. A sailor to be quite down-to-date should combine with his nautical knowledge some of the art of the blacksmith. Strength and lightness and handiness are the watchwords of to-day, and with modern methods the gear of a small craft is so simple that it takes little time to rig her.

I suppose I may take it for granted that all the running rigging was neatly coiled up and labeled and stored ashore when you went out of commission last fall. I know many smart young yachtsmen who while away many a long winter evening with pleasure and profit overhauling sheets and halyards, stropping blocks, varnishing them, splicing, serving and generally repairing all of the running gear that needs attention, making manropes, scraping and polishing the gangway ladder, the tiller, etc., and in other ways preparing for their summer's amusement. The study of navigation, the rule of the road at sea, the coast pilot, the learning of marlinspike seamanship and a rudimentary knowledge of the use of the palm and needle, so that if a sail should need some simple repairs they may be made without loss of time and without seeking aid from a sailmaker—all these the amateur will find useful. It is astonishing how much one can learn in one winter if he devotes only an hour a night to the acquirement of nautical lore.

But supposing that his running gear has not been touched since it was unrove, it will take only a short time to get it in tip-top order, and the work may be done in the evening when it is too dark to potter about the yacht.

While you are about it you may as well make a thorough job of this fitting out. Shin up the mast and make a tail-block fast to the masthead as high as possible, reeving a gantline through it so that you may sit in a boatswain's chair or in a bowline while you survey the stick. If the collars of the shrouds or forestay show any sign of chafe, they must come down and be served over again with spun yarn or covered with canvas sewn on with a palm and needle, using plenty of lead colored paint in the process to prevent rust. Examine the masthead carefully for weak parts, which generally are to be found in the wake of the rigging. If rot and signs of serious strains are met with, it is evident that a new mast is needed. Longitudinal cracks may be disregarded unless they are glaringly apparent, but transverse cracks should be viewed with suspicion.

If, after close inspection, you conclude that the mast is good enough to stand, you may as well begin to scrape it, engaging your chum to lower you down by your gantline. After scraping, use sandpaper until it is polished smooth. Then give it a couple of coats of spar varnish. If the boat has a bowsprit, treat it in the same way. If she carries a topmast, scrape and varnish it and the boom, gaff, spinnaker-boom, boathook and the oars of your dinghy as well as all blocks ashore, wherever convenient.

Next set up your rigging good and taut, taking care to stay the mast perfectly plumb—no rake aft or forward. If you carry a topmast, send it up and stay it in the usual way. Get your boom in position by means of the gooseneck and the crotch; reeve your topping-lift and hook it on to its place at the end of the boom. Get the gaff in place, hook on the throat and peak halyards, and there you are all ready to bend sails.

It is imperative that your vessel, whether she be a cruiser pure and simple or a racer, should have a well cut suit of sails. If it is your intention to treat her to the luxury of a brand new suit, I hope that you placed your order with a responsible sailmaker weeks ago. The winter is the correct time to have your sails made, when the knights of the palm and needle are not so apt to be rushed.

Yacht owners have the habit of procrastinating where sails are concerned, and postpone their orders for new canvas to the very last moment. This causes such a hurry in the loft that large orders are apt to receive the first and best attention of the sailmaker, while the owner of a moderate-sized vessel has to wait the foreman's convenience; whereas, if an order is placed before, say, Christmas, one of the firm is as likely as not to give the matter his personal attention, measure your craft himself, and let the cut and the sit of the sails have the benefit of his own supervision. It is also a fact that the sailmaking firms make it a point to keep their best men at work all the year round, while the mere ordinary workmen are "laid off" when the season closes. The consequence is that the yachtsman who orders his sails in good time has the advantage of the most skillful craftsmen in the market, and he is likely, too, to have better prices quoted him than in the rush of the season, when all hands are hard at it. Therefore, my advice is to take early action and win the best results at the most favorable figure.

It was always my custom, before unbending my yacht's sails preparatory to going out of commission, to summon my sailmaker aboard and take him for a short trip, pointing out what I considered to be the defects in the muslin and listening to his suggestions for their remedy. He would make notes in his memorandum-book and inscribe certain hieroglyphic marks on the sails themselves. When the canvas was unbent he would send for it, make the repairs and alterations at his leisure and store the sails for me until the spring, when I would find them in perfect condition for setting. All this was done for moderate compensation, considering the excellence of the workmanship.