Healthful Sports for Boys Part 4

Shrouds are strong supporting ropes reaching from the masts to the sides of the boat.

Ratlines are little ropes fastened to the shrouds by which sailors may climb up or down.

The painter is a rope at the bow, used to fasten small boats as a halter fastens a horse.

Windward means the side of the boat against which the wind blows.

Leeward, opposite side to windward.

Ballast weights of stone, iron or bags of sand used to balance the boat. A good way to learn about the parts of a boat is to whittle out a small working model. This is a help, but only the actual experience can teach you how to manage a sail and at the same time steer the boat. Of course, you can learn this for yourself, but the better way is to serve an apprenticeship to some more experienced companion.

The first essential to a sail boat is that it should be well made and properly balanced. The second, that it should be carefully rigged, and the third that the man in charge should know just how to avail himself of these advantages.

Sailing before the wind is easy enough. It is in tacking and beating up against the wind that skill and care are required. Jibing, that is changing the boom and sail when tacking, requires the greatest care, particularly if the wind is stiff, and beginners should never be permitted to attempt it.

Where the water is apt to be rough, the sail of every boat should be provided with reefing points--that is little ropes. They are on both sides of the sail. The sail is rolled up from the bottom and tied down to the boom. This is called "reefing" or "shortening" sail.

At nights small boats and canoes should carry lights, as before indicated. It is a difficult thing to make a sailor through books. The best that can be done is to advise what to do, and still more, _what not to do._

ADVICE

Don't overload the boat.

Don't carry too much sail.

Don't trust yourself alone in strange waters.

Don't leave your anchor at home.

Don't forget your oars.

Don't sit on the gunwale-the edge of the boat.

Don't alter course too suddenly.

Don't let go the helm for an instant.

Don't mistake caution for cowardice.

Don't be afraid to reef.

Don't let your gear get snarled.

Don't jibe in a stiff wind.

Don't get rattled.

Don't sail with "fool" companions.

Of course, there are many other "don'ts" that will suggest themselves to the sensible boy; among them, "Don't fail to keep your boat pumped out or bailed," and "don't forget to carry an anchor of some sort,"

and not the least important," don't leave your eatables and drinkables ash.o.r.e."

CHAPTER VII

SOME SMALL, SAIL BOATS THAT CAN BE MADE IN THE WINTER, OR THAT CAN BE BOUGHT WITHOUT MUCH MONEY

There is no small boat so popular or so generally useful as the American catboat. The cat can sail into the very eye of the wind, while before the wind she is a flier, and yet she is not the best sail boat for a beginner. Let me tell you why: First, the sail is heavy and so it is hard to hoist and reef. Second, in going before the wind there is constant danger of jibing with serious results. Third, the catboat has a very bad habit of rolling when sailing before the wind, and each time the boat rolls from side to side she is liable to dip the end of her heavy boom in the water and "trip herself up." When a boat trips up she does not necessarily go down, but she is likely to upset, placing the young sailors in an unenviable, if not dangerous, position. Fourth, when the craft begins to swagger before the wind she is liable to "goose neck," that is throw her boom up against the mast, which is another accident fraught with the possibilities of serious mischief.

Mr. Dan Beard, the famous American artist and author, and an authority in such matters, thinks the sloop is the most graceful of all the single masters. This is the type of our great yacht racers. Next to the sloop, and very much like it, is the schooner rig yacht. This is a fine boat, but beyond the pockets of boys; however, smaller sizes can be rigged on the same plan, with a jib and mainsail, and they will be found to be both safe and swift.

THE CONSTRUCTION

Without careful working drawings, which but few boys could manage without the aid of a skilled workman, it would be impossible to show just how a good sail boat can be made. It should be said, however, that the ordinary rowboat may be easily changed into a sail boat, provided a keel is attached, or a lee board provided. The latter, as you know, is a broad piece of board that is slipped, when needed, into a groove along the side of the boat, to keep it from drifting when the wind is not full astern.

Good, light string timber that is easily worked should always be chosen. See that it is free from knots; if this cannot be had, do not try to build a boat.

After all, unless all the conditions are favorable, and you have great talent for such work, it will be easier to save your money and then buy such a boat as you need, or if you cannot do this, get a carpenter who knows how to build such a craft to make the boat for you.

I have known cases where a number of boys, living near the water, bought a sail boat which they owned in common. Each had the right to its use on a fixed day, though, as they were school fellows, it happened that they usually went out together. The latter is the better way, provided always that when the crew starts off for a cruise it is distinctly understood that one of the number is to be the captain for the time and is to be obeyed accordingly.

It was told when I was a boy, but I doubted the story then and I don't believe it now, that when migrating squirrels, that do not take kindly to the water, reach a wide stream they secure bits of wood or bark large enough to float them, then with their tails erect to catch the wind they sail gaily across.

The natives of North Australia, the most primitive people of whom we have any knowledge, use logs, singly or lashed together with vines, to cross rivers and arms of the sea.

CANOES

Our own American Indians were more advanced. Even the rudest of them had learned before the coming of the white man to hollow out the log by means of fire and to shape it with stone axes into the form of the present canoe.

The birch-bark canoe, made by the Indians of the northern rivers and lakes, is really a work of art. It is a model of lightness, and when we consider its frailty, and then the way in which it can be managed in the most turbulent currents, our admiration is divided between the craft of the maker and the surprising skill of the man who handles the paddle.

The ancestor of the graceful yacht and of the great ocean steamers, that carry their thousands with as much comfort as if they were on sh.o.r.e, is the rude canoe or raft of our own forefathers.

It is from these forefathers that we have inherited our love for outdoor life, for fishing and for water, and the instinctive desire to hunt which is inborn in every healthy boy.

EVOLUTION

In the evolution of water craft, the vessel propelled by pole, paddle or oar must have preceded the use of sails. The former required more strength and the latter more skill. But no matter what science and art may do to make sailing more secure and comfortable, the boy, particularly if he be country bred, and so forced to be more self- reliant, will have a try at the raft, dingey or canoe before he aspires to anything more elaborate and expensive.

I like work that develops the ingenuity of the boy. On a long mill pond out in Kentucky--this was some years ago--I came upon some boys who were managing a raft propelled by a sail made from two bed sheets.

The body of this strange craft consisted of four logs, sharpened at the bow and of varying length, so as to present a wedge point to the water. Across the logs cleats were nailed that kept them together and answered for a deck. A stout pole, secured in front, served for a mast and a smaller pole, with a piece of board nailed to the end, acted as a rudder.

On board this strange craft there were four boys and a dog, the latter, judging from his barking, quite wild with the fun of it.

Before the wind this sailing raft made good time, but as the craft refused to tack, the boys lowered the sail and poled back for another try, just as boys clamber up hill in winter for the sheer joy of coasting down.

OTHER BOATS