it with your own knowledge and experience, and put into action the result.

These talks are not intended for men who are what we may call seamen, men who are thoroughly versed in the art, nor are they intended for those who aspire to boats larger than forty feet over all. A boat above that size is too valuable to be trusted in the hands of an inexperienced or half-trained man. The owner of a large yacht, if he is not perfectly capable of handling her under all conditions, should hire some one who is. My sermons are addressed to the man who is learning to handle a small vessel, who wants to be a seaman, and who, to be free of all paid assistance, is willing to study the art thoroughly and make himself master of all its branches.

ON SEAMANSHIP

"The tar's a smart tar that can band, reef and steer,
That can nimbly cast off and belay;
Who in darkest nights finds each halyard and gear,
And dead reckoning knows well, and leeway;
But the tar to please me must more knowing be."—
Dibden—(Modernized).

ON SEAMANSHIP

I have been all my life a lover of the sea; an observer of its natural and social conditions; a student of its phases and fabrics; but while my mind in its long and wide search has touched upon almost every subject connected with ocean life, the one that has constantly interested and fascinated me is that which relates to the care and government of sailing vessels. This art, which is called seamanship, is one of man's oldest and noblest attainments. What does the world owe to him who possessed it?

To him the civilization of to-day owes its existence. Man cramped in the confines of a continent, a prisoner at low-water mark, a dwarf in a dwarf world, was released, lifted and enlightened by the Master of the Sail. It was he who found the universe upon the sea, and brought it home; a free gift, with the more costly but less valuable trophies of distant trade. It was he who, broadening the world's world, broadened the world's mind. With the spices and silks of the East, with the gold and tobaccos of the West, he laded his ships with the new knowledge, a commodity that paid no revenues to the crown, that added nothing to the wealth and glory of princes, but, flowing slowly and steadily into the minds of men, incited the intelligent few to broader, nobler and more splendid achievements, and filtering through the masses, long steeped in inveterate ignorance, uplifted, enriched and regenerated all.

In the shadow of his sail hamlets became cities; wealth increased, suffering diminished. In his callous hands, the helm, that through daylight and darkness guided his vessel from land to land, was more marvelous in its powers than the famed ivory wand of the Eastern genii; and to all who sought to receive, his sail bore more jewels than ever burdened the magic carpet, or came into the hands of the daring and fortunate through the incantations of the Sons of the Hidden Light. While with one hand he struggled with chaffering Trade for her sordid coin, with the other he threw into the laps of Science and Art innumerable treasures. Impartial in his generosity as in his gifts, he gave to Astronomy new constellations, to Medicine rare and efficacious herbs, to Art fresh and invigorating colors, and to Literature a strange breed of heroes, novel situations and unfamiliar plots.

The freedom that he found upon the high seas he brought back to cheer the slaves of the mart. Kings bargained for his services, nobles and merchants offered their purses to assist in his ventures. In return for three paltry vessels he presented Spain with an empire; to prove a chimera false he perished among the northern ices. No sea was too broad to daunt him; no land was too distant to escape his search. The miseries he endured, the hardships he underwent, were forgotten in the joys of a new discovery. He opened roads of trade that brought riches and power to his country, and sprinkled these pathways with the bones of his companions—victims of exposure, famine and disease.

No reef lifts above the water, no shallow spreads its treacherous sands, but the frames of his vessel have been broken upon it. The hurricane and calm have taken toll of him; he has paid the penalty of recklessness and greed. He has given to the annals of war its most desperate and bloody conflicts; he has perished that nations might live, and that a people might be free.

His life gave him strength and endurance; his art made him skillful and courageous. He created and used a language of his own, and his customs were not those of other men. The inventor of the sail, the user of the elements, the discoverer, the trader, the protector, the world's benefactor—the seaman.

A noble art makes noble men, and there is no nobler art than seamanship. As free and changeful in its measures as are the elements it employs and combats, it is prolific of resource, fertile in expedient, and a prompter of mental activity. It promotes skill of hand and tenacity of muscle. Courage is bred in its duties, and the mind broadens in its services.

It is this that makes the practice of seamanship so valuable to those who employ it only as a pastime. The care and handling of the sailing vessel furnishes most excellent training for the young. Aside from the skill it imparts, it takes men out into the open air; it offers to those whom the obligations of life keep at the counter and desk an opportunity to be free, to get away from and completely out of the business world. It gives the mart-worn mind a change and a rest. The sea has no postmen; no telegraph messengers. It prints no newspapers. The feet of society merely tread its borders. It is a place where man is really free, and where he can realize his freedom.

Many have written upon this art. Some of these works are an addition to literature and of value to the seaman, but the majority are not. On that branch of seamanship, which we will call yachtmanship, and which is principally the art of sparring, rigging, canvasing and handling fore-and-aft vessels, there has been penned several large works and many small ones. The standard books are by Vanderdecken and Kemp, and the majority of the others, I am sorry to say, are in the most part copies of these two. In some cases the authors have lifted their information bodily, and have forgotten to acknowledge the indebtedness. While standard works of their time, both Vanderdecken and Kemp are now out of date, and, moreover, they deal largely with big vessels, and vessels of a type no longer employed in yachting.

Among the smaller works there are several good ones, but they lack originality and do not properly cover the ground, nor do they contain the information which is most necessary to the beginner. Again, many of them have been written by men who are enslaved by one type, and are therefore considerably biased; others are from the pen of those who have had a special and not a general experience.

But the crowning defect of all these books, to my mind, is that the authors in the portion relating to handling try to teach a man, instead of prompting him to learn. You cannot teach a man to sail—he may learn. In order to do so he must have the sailor instinct. Unless he has that he will never become a seaman. That is why some men can never learn to handle a boat, and why others will pick up the knowledge