THE ROYAL CRUISING CLUB JOURNAL.* THE annual Journal of this

well-known Club, containing logs of the ,best cruises made by members during the year, is • • The Royal Cruising Club Journal Season 1913. Loudon re.nted for the BoysKetator Club 10 C. F. BowQrt.Jh es k'etter Lathe, . . always good reading. This year it is equal to its best. It is true that last summer was a fine one for yachting, and con- sequently there are not many accounts of anxious nights spent in heavy weather which required all the skill and endurance of amateur skippers to bring their small vessels safely through the triaL But year by year the standard of the cruises seems to become more adventurous. To win the chief prize of the Club a few years ago it used to be enough to carry out a sea- manlike cruise in British waters without professional help in the navigation. But lately the winners have penetrated the Arctic Circle or have reached the southern shores of the Bay of Biscay in such vessels as would never have attempted the stormy waters of the Bay even in the days of McMullen, whose loge are a sort of gospel to the modern small cruiser. But as there is generally a limit, set by circumstances, to the distance which the competitors can travel from their own coast—for they necessarily bore to complete their cruises during their holidays or their leave—a new form of venture- someness has been adopted. This consists of taking a wife or a sister as the only crew of a small yacht. A woman's physical strength may be assumed to be scarcely equal to that of a man, even if she understands seamanship well enough to take charge in the event of a mishap to the skipper.

We do not enry Mr. Justice Cbannell his annual task of judging the cruises and awarding the prizes. Few cases in a Court of Law, we should think, can ever leave him in such doubt whether he has judged rightly. It is, indeed, a very difficult balance that he has to strike. A winning cruise must be adventurous, no doubt. But be must not approve of it merely for that reason. If the cruise were reckless—care- less of all seamanlike qualities—it would defeat the very objects for which the Club exists. With luck a man—to take an illus- tration—might reach the French coast in a coracle without compass or chart or log, but he would not deserve a prize. At least, we feel sure that if he sent in an account of his cruise Mr. Justice Channell would give him a good slating for folly and impudence. There may come a time when it will be necessary to say that a vessel has been manned so inade- quately that the risks taken were unseamanlike. That point has not yet been reached. The logs in the new Journal all show that though, of course, bad luck might have meant disaster, the skippers had no intention whatever of getting into trouble. They all took just reasonable "sporting" risks, backing their experience and vigilance against the elements.

Last summer, as we have said, was a fine one. The only member who was pursued by a spell of really heavy weather was Captain Gordon Shephard, who cruised late in the year, and was the winner of the Club Cup. Undoubtedly he brought his yacht through dangerous storms, and overcame more difficulties than anyone else. He left Christiania on October 4th in the 'Asgard,' a 28-ton ketch, lent to him by Mr. Erskine Childers. He sailed up the Norwegian coast as far as Bergen, then crossed to Lerwick, and, by way of the North-West of Scotland and North-East of Ireland, reached Holyhead. After leaving Bergen he met with almost continuous gales, which 'split most of his sails and carried away his bow- sprit. Mr. Erskine Childers had cruised about two thousand five hundred miles in the Asgard' earlier in the year, but bad had good weather. Probably the gear had been somewhat Weakened, and the judge confesses that he was doubtful whether he ought not to have penalized Captain Shepherd for starting with defective gear. However, as Captain Shephard was bringing home a friend's yacht from abroad, he received the benefit of the doubt. Captain Shepherd describes his experiences in the gale of November 2nd— a gale which observers of the weather will not have for- gotten NOVBMBER 2so.—Ardglaes to Holyhead. Bar. 2940, 2045. The wind veered to the S.W. during the early hours of the morning. This means some protection at Ardglass, and it is possible to lay one's course straight out of the harbour with sails fulL We took this opportunity of getting away, and left at 10.30 a.m. under three-reefed mainsail, three-reefed mizen, reefed foresail and third jib. During the afternoon the wind was change- able between S. and W.S.W., but it did not moderate, nor did the rain cease. Beat across the bay, and at 3.30 p.m. we were to the leeward of Annalong. At 7 p.m. the occulting light outside C,arlingford Lough bore W.N.W., 5 miles distant; we were there- fore nearly far enough down to stand in on port tack with a berth liellyhxuster Rock and the sheets North of the entrance, At

this moment the rain turned into a deluge, the light was obscured, and the wind became very strong. The bowsprit was the first thing to carry away ; it broke off at the stem-head. The bowsprit is only 22 ft. over all, and the outboard portion cannot be much more than 12 ft. ' • its diameter at the stem-head is 7 in., so one cannot say that the spar was a weak one. Curiously neither the bobstay nor the topmast forestay parted, and with the aid of ropes we succeeded in getting the wreckage and the third jib intact on board. By this time the foresail had scudded; the third jib was set as a foresail, and we contrived to lie hove-to on starboard tack. Several mainsail-hoops were then cut and the sail rolled down as much as possible ; the mizen was also j stowed, as, with only the third jib just forward of the mast, this sail brought the yacht too much up into the wind.

Two stout sheets had been bent on to the third jib, one was a 2-in. manilla rope, and the other a bass-rope generally used as a short warp. However, with the wind we got twenty minutes later, something had to go, and as the storm-jib is is very strong sail, it was the sheets which parted. It was no easy matter to get the jib on deck, and as the sail was slatting in the wind before it could be lowered, it knocked against and broke the port light-board and lashed the foresail halyards, which had been made fast to the light-board, into ribbons. It is a wonder how the sail itself stood the treatment it received. Tho squall had now reached its height, the wind had veered to the W., and its strength was violent. When we arrived at Holyhead on the following afternoon we were told they had had a strong gale in the night, with a squall at 8 p.m., during which the wind attained a velocity of 75 miles per hour. 1 afterwards obtained from the Meteorological Office the weather report for this night, and found that what we had been told was correct. The report records gales at stations down the coast, and mentions a squall 75 miles per hour (force 11) at Holyhead, and gusts at Southport up to 66 miles per hour (force 11)."

The Homola Cup was won by Mr. H. R. Carson, who in a 7k-ton auxiliary cutter, with only his sister as crew, cruised from Copenhagen to Kronstadt and home to England. A

difficulty for Mr. Justice Channell was to decide whether be ought to penalize Mr. Carson, as against other competitors,

because be allowed himself from May to September to do the cruise. In other words, he gave himself time to pick his weather. In another season this might have cost Mr. Carson

the prize, but, as it happened, those who had to accept all

weathers for want of time were not out in anything very bad. Mr. Cockburn, with only his wife as crew, sailed an eight-tonner (no motor) from Hamble to Brest, down the French coast to Penerf, and hack to Bamb!e, in twenty-seven days.

The Claymore Cup for boats not exceeding seven tons was won by Mr. G. H. Millar, who sailed—for a large part of the cruise single-handed—from Essex to the Scillies and the

Channel Islands and back to Port Victoria. When he was almost home he piled his vessel up on the Long Nose, the chalky ledge that runs out from the Foreland east of Margate. But the merits of his well-conducted cruise were so great in other respects that the judge felt compelled to overlook this mistake.

For the rest, the Journal contains as usual some excellent hints which are the result of the experience of men who have

brought intelligence to bear on their hobby. Mr. Highfield's dinghy-hoist is simple and practical. Some of the " wrinkles " in past Journals have become almost universally practised by

cruisers, as, for instance, Dr. Gland Worth's device for increas.

ing the holding power of an anchor by sliding is weight down the chain. The snubbing of a vessel in a sea is then much

less likely to break out the anchor, as the weight has to be lifted by the chain each time the vessel is flung upwards, and the whole motion becomes easier. A light anchor, in fact, becomes the equivalent of a much heavier one.