SHIPS AND SEAMEN

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22504, 23 February 1935, Page 4

SHIPS AND SEAMEN

A SEAFARING MISCELLANY . ," The Sailor’s Way.” ■By A. R. Evans, Master Mariner. .Illustrated. Edinburgh: Blackwood, :11s. ” Watch on Deck.” By , Jtt. L. Bearden; Commander, R.N. (retd.).- Illustrated. London; Blackle. 11s.' ’ _ ' . • ' "A Century of Sea Stories.” Edited by Rafael Sabatinl. London; Hutchinson. 6s. “ Ships and Seamen." By Geoffrey Rawson. Home University Library,; No. 172. London: Thornton Butterwofth. 3s 9d. “ The Australian Boys’ Book of Boats: Sailing Models.” By J. Cooper-Vines. Illustrated. Sydney: Angus,and Robertson. 2s. Round the Horn In this better-than-ordinary sea book the late Captain A'. R! Evans gives an account of a voyage in sail from Cardin around thb Horn to the Pacific Coast of the United States and home again. The time was many years ago, .when the author had just completed his four years apprenticeship; the vessel a huge fourmastfer built on the Clyde snf years before; ‘“-typically representative of the sailifijir ship ■designer's filial effort to pro-duce,-by a combination of speed and size, a class of vessel which, with wind-prppel-Jing power alone, could prove commercially successful, against the type of cargo ships.” Some idea of the size of the ship can be obtained from figures: more than two acres of Bail spread, with the mainsails area greater than two tennis courts, and twenty-two miles of wire and rope. , The voyage was hard, and therefore, the author is satisfied, representative of the later days of sail, as of the earlier, and not particularly eventful. This book has not, indeed, been Written for the sensation-seeker, but the reader with a real, interest in the day-to-day life of the old-time sailor. Nevertheless, besides Captain Evans’s excellent, unaffected, description of everything interesting about the voyage, there is sufficient incident.. Captain’ Evans gives a vivid description of heavy-weather work; tells how an apprentice who went overboard was rescued through the prompt and plucky action of the second mate, who dived after him, and the efficient action of the crew in bringing the heavy ship found promptly; and how, on the homeward run, a distress message from a disabled Russian barque was received, but when, at daybreak, it was at last possible to launch boats, no sign of,the unfortunate vessel or her crew remained. The large number of masculine readers who seek their adventure in tales of the sea will find "The Sailor’s Way” very much to their fancy. . An Autobiography

Commander Bearden’s “Watch on Deck” has the advantage of a more attractive dust 1 cover, and its author, as a professional writer, gives this book a more literary flavour than “ The Sailor’s Way but there is no need to draw, comparisons between two excellent seafaring narratives, one confined to a single voyage, the other an: autobiography. The author .of “Watch on Deck’’ commenced his career at sea as an apprentice on a sailing ship, and when he forsook, it. “ for the 1 oldest of reasons, the winning of a lady’s favour,” and turned to authorship, he had, seen service with the Orient Line and, obtaining a naval command, served through the war with distinction. The unusually varied experience which he obtained has given , him opportunity of knowing the sea in all her responses to •the adventurings of the mariner. Fol-, lowers of the interminable Jutland controversy will be interested in the author’s account of the battle, of which ,he was an eye-witness. His view is that Jutland was no German victory, though it revealed “ the 1 faulty • construction of our ships and the inferiority of our shells, range-finders, and torpedoes.” Others may prefer his recollections of the hard life of his early days under sail or of his service on the famous Orient Line passenger ships. The volume is fully illustrated.

Sea Stories A. companion volume to- “A Century of Humour,” “A Century of Creepy Stories,”, and the other low-priced, wellfilled series of “ omnibus books ” recently issued by Hutchinson is “A Century of Sea . Stories” (from Whitcombe" and Tombs). Its editor, Rafael Sabatini, explains that the book is not for “ those exalted intellectuals tq whom plot in . a story is the sign of puerility, who deprecate invention in fiction, look askance on the romantic, and for whom no piece of writing cari be distinguished if it has the temerity to be dramatic.” So the reader knows what to expect of the stories in the book, that they shall have events in them, romance, and, above all. what Mr Sabatini calls “ the flavour of salt.” The selection is wide. It includes Dickens’s famous description of the tempest, from “ David Copperfield,” Melville’s “ The Death of the White Whale,” from “Moby Dick,” incidents! from Mark Twain’s “ Innocents Abroad,” the works of Marryat, Kingsley, Conrad, Jules Verne, while among the contemporaries represented are H. M. Tomlinson, de Vere Stacpoole, H.. E. Bates, Victor MacClure, R. Austin Freeman. The quality of the stories, or incidents, is necessarily uneven, and there are some glaring omissions, notably Jack London, but whatever criticism may be levelled at the book from the “ exalted intellectual ” point of view, its 1024 pages represent value for money.' -

Past and Present In the one hundred and seventy-second volume of the “ Home University Library” the biographer of Beatty makes a 250-page survey almost as wide as the title. Ships and Seamen.” The scope is, in fact, much too comprehensive for compression to this extent, but Mr Rawson has done well in making his book as concise and coherent as it is. Nevertheless, the reader must wonder why, in a volume which deals largely With the modern shipping industry, the author should attempt to examine its antecedents at _ all when he is compelled to do so in such a sketchv fashion. True, “the great days of sail” laid “the foundations on which shipping of to-day has been built,” but theyrequire at least_ a volume to themselves or, if the subject is to be treated historicaljy from past to present, it would be better

handled in a long essay than by references here to a mariner of the past, there with detailed descriptions of technical apparatus on the modern liner. This book, however, is sufficiently informative not to be neglected by amateurs of seamanship.

Model Ships “ The Australian Boys’ Book of Boats ” provides a full understanding of the principles involved in the sailing of a boat, and deals with the questions of rigs and rigging and the construction of sailing models in an authoritative manner. It is an excellent handbook to a craft which has its devotees among young and old, and is fully illustrated with diagrams. M‘G.