Selected Works of Edward Frederick Knight
Edward Frederick Knight
9781465521781
213 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
In the summer of ‘86 I was without my favourite toy, a yacht, and had no intention of purchasing a vessel. I had just returned from a winter cruise about the Spanish Main and through the West Indies, and any voyage more extensive than a boating expedition on the upper Thames was quite out of my mind, when I by chance came across a boat lying at Hammersmith— of all unlikely places— which appeared to me to be singularly adapted for the realization of one of my earliest yachting dreams. For many years I had talked of visiting the Baltic in a small yacht, and I had often taken up the charts and pilot-books of that tideless sea and planned pleasant cruises among the deep, winding fiords and narrow sounds of the Danish islands; and now I saw before me the very boat for the purpose. “The smaller the yacht the better the sport,” is a maxim which, in my opinion, holds good in most waters, but especially so when a cruise on the Baltic is in question. For on all the shores of that sea, even where the map indicates long, straight stretches of ironbound coast, there are innumerable small artificial havens which have been constructed by the herring fishermen for the accommodation of their shallow craft; and again, on many of the islands, the only harbours are those affording shelter to the ferry-boats which ply to the mainland harbours, as a rule, having no more than three feet of water. Therefore small yachts only can visit these out-of-the-way spots. A cruise among the islands affords some of the fascination of a voyage of discovery; at many of them sea-going vessels never call; and as all the English yachts that enter the Baltic are of considerable tonnage, the English yachtsman knows but little of the charms of the best cruising-ground in Europe. The Baltic is a treacherous sea; settled weather can never be depended on, gales spring up very unexpectedly, and a nasty sea rises quickly on its shallow waters. But a little yacht following the coast has nearly always some snug harbour to run for should bad weather come on; whereas a larger craft with deeper draught must needs stand out to sea and make the best of it she can. The small yacht is certainly the one for the Baltic, but to get her there is a somewhat difficult task. To arrive at the mouth of the river Eider, whence the Baltic can be reached by canal, involves a voyage across the North Sea and a lengthy cruise along the coast of Holland and Germany. Unless the yachtsman has exceptional luck with his weather this journey is likely to cause him a considerable amount of anxiety; for the east coast of the North Sea, with its dangerous shoals, tumbling seas, and lack of harbours to run for, is certainly the last the skipper of a small yacht would select for a pleasure cruise. But once let him reach the mouth of the Eider and he will be more than compensated for his preliminary difficulties and hardships. The yacht at Hammersmith possessed two qualities not usually found together. She was of very light draught and yet she was an excellent sea-boat. She drew something under three feet, and so could enter the shallowest Danish boat-harbour. With her if I saw a port before me I could run in boldly, not needing a pilot, and without troubling my head about the depth of water; for, where any other boat had gone before mine was able to follow. She also looked like a craft that would put up with a good deal of heavy weather, and could be trusted to carry one safely across the North Sea. I saw that she was, in short, the very vessel I required; so I came to terms with her owner, and soon found that I had no reason to be disappointed with my bargain. The Falcon— for so I named her after my former vessel— was an old P. and O. life-boat, and had doubtless made many a voyage to India and back on a steamer’s deck. As is the way with life-boats, her bow and stern were alike, and she had far more sheer than is ever given to a yacht.
