BEAUTY'S PERVERSITY

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 561, 14 January 1929, Page 11

BEAUTY'S PERVERSITY

SHIP THAT WOULD NOT BE LAUNCHED VALKYRIE’S DEFIANCE Beauty, not infrequently is perverse. For instance, a beautiful new schooner-yacht called the Valkyrie, whose building has just been completed by Charles Bailey and Son, Ltd., and whose launching was timed for 10 o’clock this morning, obstinately refused to taken the water, despite the exertions of two tow launches and a dozen men. After waiting for several days for a suitable tide the builders made an effort to launch the vessel last evening. She slid 20ft down the incline and would budge no further. Operations were then suspended until this morning. Shortly before ten on “Valkyrie” a blue pennant was run to the foremast* a club burgee to the main, and the red ensign to the stern. Captain E. Gilling, to whose order Valkyrie was built, paced the deck of his new command. The captain’s wife, in seafaring garb, ■was also on board. Immediately the tide had given its maximum flow a line was made fast to a launch. At a signal from Captain Gilling the tug bent to Valkyrie deadweight of 30 tons. Nothing happened. The effort, repeated with the assistance of a workman, up to the shoulders *n the water, at a timber j.Vu wall equally futile. Further - > impts failed. Then the launchman Inc Lipon the idea of taking a sort of running jump at the task. The new three-inch line snapped, and Valkyrie trembled, but moved not an inch. Tho line 'was doubled, the lai leh took another run, and—the refractory ship conceded a.foot. Meantime, the water had slackened, and the Valkyrie was very little, if any, nearer being afloat. “Launch ahoy!” shouted Captain Gilling to a passing towboat. Then the power of 80 horses, tandem fashion, flung back their hels. The pretty ves- ; sel shook herself, but strenuously declined to give even a foot. Two more three-inch lines burst asunder. Various expedients were tried. Grease, plumbago, and soft soap had been inberally applied, but nothing would shift Valkyrie. “Well, we are a lot of Jonahs,” said Mr. Charles Bailey, as he dismissed the tugs. “I have never experienced any- | thing like it in my 50 years’ in the f business,”