STEVENSON'S SILVER SHIP.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume IV, Issue 953, 1 March 1917, Page 4

STEVENSON'S SILVER SHIP.

NOW A FISH TRADER. The "Silver Ship" has come upon evil days. Once a rich man's expensive toy, later the yacht that carried "Robert Louis Stevenson to his last home at Vailima, in the South Seas, now, with her wings clipped and an ill-smelling gas engine doing the work her sails once did, the schooner Casco is employed in the North Pacific Ocean bringing home cargoes of fish.

The Silver Ship, the picturesque nickname given the schooner by the natives of Fakarava when Stevenson sailed to their country, served some years as the private yacht of a San Francisco milliinaire. In ISBB Stevenson was induced by failing health to try a desperate venture. He invested all of his money, 10,000 dollars, in the charter of the Casco, with the intention of spending a few months cruising in the Sent!) Sens and writing a book of travels. The iourney ended when the author chose his Samoan home at Vailima, where he died six years later.

After the Stevenson voyage the Casco joined the notorious seal-poaching fleet that used to sail, in the early '9o's, out of Victoria, British Columbia. Her wonderful speed under sail many times served in good stead at this hazardous frame. When pelagic sealing finally ended by

joint treaty between Great Britain, Japan, and the United States, the Casco lay idle until four years ago, when she was bought cheap, to be turned into a fisherman. The high topmasts were cut down, a gas engine was installed, and only fragments of the white and gold panelling in her cabin tell of the days of her glory.