ADRIATIC MOTOR SAILERS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22632, 25 July 1935, Page 3

ADRIATIC MOTOR SAILERS

NONDESCRIPT VESSELS It is a well-known fact that, throughout the eastern hemisphere, a large.'proportion of the merchant shipping from port to port along jagged coast lines is carried on by small fleets of tiny nondescript vessels for which there is no name. They are, generally speaking, small opendecked, broad-beamed, shallow draft hulls propelled by a combination of sails and auxiliary engines. Ceaselessly they ply up and down the coast between neighbouring harbours, no one carrying a great deal of cargo—but in the aggregate accounting for a really amazing total of tonnage. Italy, due to her unusual geographic formation, has a large number of these motor-sailing vessels. Some of the pic—turesqueness of Old World harbours is due in a large measure to these tiny work-horses of the sea. Taken as a whole, these vessels are very similar. In their principal characteristics they are not unlike craft engaged in the same trade in other parts of the world. But those of the Adriatic —with their black sails and well-rounded bows—have an appearance which sets them apart from any other. A typical example of such a motorsailer is the Marco Folo, of 75 tons gross,which is equipped with a 36 h.p. DicselBenz engine and belongs to Captain Angelo Bertozzi of Cattolica, Italy. Captain Bertozzi is the owner of a fleet of three 6uch. vessels.

As a matter of fact, the large number of these vessels in Italy has led the Vacuum Oil Company of Genoa, to place supplies of lubricating oil at all convenient coastal points—so that fleets may have the advantage of additional delivery service for marine oils.