“If I may be pardoned for proposing such a name, I should say call her the Lady Julia,” answered Dick, after a few moments’ consideration.
“Lady Julia, I have no doubt, would be flattered,” said Lord Reginald, with perfect gravity, “and I should be very happy to call our craft after her; but I think, as you are the architect, and not only the architect but chief constructor, that she should be called after your sister. In my opinion the Janet is a very pretty name.”
“I would rather that you settled the point,” answered Dick, “and if you think fit to call her the Janet, I shall be perfectly pleased.”
“The Janet she shall be, then,” answered Lord Reginald; and from thenceforth their craft was called the Janet by the two Crusoes.
After standing on for some distance, Lord Reginald proposed that they should go about. This required no little skill and activity. It was necessary to haul down a foresail and mainsail. This they did, Dick leaping from one to the other, and shifting the yards over, ready to hoist again, the staysail bringing her round, but as, from her length, she was a long time about it, Dick found it necessary to get out one of the paddles, a few strokes with which were of great service.
Lord Reginald managed the mizzen, while Dick rehoisted the foresail and mainsail. The rudder, it should have been said, was fitted with long yoke-lines, which, being led well forward, made the operation of steering more easy than it would otherwise have been.
“I suspect that in a heavy sea we shall find that the Janet doesn’t come about as well as we should wish,” observed Lord Reginald.
“We shall improve by practice,” said Dick, “and you forget that in a heavy sea we shall not be carrying our mainsail, and may be even without the foresail, so that we shall only have the fore-staysail and mizzen to manage, and we may expect to be favoured with calm weather. She goes to windward, at all events.”
Still, Lord Reginald, like many other naval officers, was not much accustomed to sailing boats, and was less satisfied with the sea qualities of their craft than he could have wished.
Dick’s trips on board the Nancy had taught him how a lugger should be managed, but she had, he confessed, a more numerous crew than that of the Janet. However, he hoped by activity to make up for that deficiency.