inhabitants of these isles nearly as much as to their inborn love
of the sea. But the writer of the article in question goes on to

point out, with insight and justice, that for a great number of
people (20,000, I think he says) it is a means of livelihood - that

it is, in his own words, an industry. Now, the moral side of an
industry, productive or unproductive, the redeeming and ideal

aspect of this bread-winning, is the attainment" target="_blank" title="n.达到；得到；造诣">attainment and preservation of
the highest possible skill on the part of the craftsmen. Such

skill, the skill of technique, is more than honesty; it is
something wider, embracing honesty and grace and rule in an

elevated and clear sentiment, not altogether utilitarian, which may
be called the honour of labour. It is made up of accumulated

tradition, kept alive by individual pride, rendered exact by
professional opinion, and, like the higher arts, it spurred on and

sustained by discriminating praise.
This is why the attainment" target="_blank" title="n.达到；得到；造诣">attainment of proficiency, the pushing of your

skill with attention to the most delicate shades of excellence, is
a matter of vital concern. Efficiency of a practically flawless

kind may be reached naturally in the struggle for bread. But there
is something beyond - a higher point, a subtle and unmistakable

touch of love and pride beyond mere skill; almost an inspiration
which gives to all work that finish which is almost art - which IS

art.
As men of scrupulous honour set up a high standard of public

conscience above the dead-level of an honest community, so men of
that skill which passes into art by ceaseless striving raise the

dead-level of correct practice in the crafts of land and sea. The
conditions fostering the growth of that supreme, alive excellence,

as well in work as in play, ought to be preserved with a most
careful regard lest the industry or the game should perish of an

insidious and inward decay. Therefore I have read with profound
regret, in that article upon the yachting season of a certain year,

that the seamanship on board racing yachts is not now what it used
to be only a few, very few, years ago.

For that was the gist of that article, written evidently by a man
who not only knows but UNDERSTANDS - a thing (let me remark in

passing) much rarer than one would expect, because the sort of
understanding I mean is inspired by love; and love, though in a

sense it may be admitted to be stronger than death, is by no means
so universal and so sure. In fact, love is rare - the love of men,

of things, of ideas, the love of perfected skill. For love is the
enemy of haste; it takes count of passing days, of men who pass

away, of a fine art matured slowly in the course of years and
doomed in a short time to pass away too, and be no more. Love and

regret go hand in hand in this world of changes swifter than the
shifting of the clouds reflected in the mirror of the sea.

To penalize a yacht in proportion to the fineness of her
performance is unfair to the craft and to her men. It is unfair to

the perfection of her form and to the skill of her servants. For
we men are, in fact, the servants of our creations. We remain in

everlasting bondage to the productions of our brain and to the work
of our hands. A man is born to serve his time on this earth, and

there is something fine in the service being given on other grounds
than that of utility. The bondage of art is very exacting. And,

as the writer of the article which started this train of thought
says with lovablewarmth, the sailing of yachts is a fine art.

His contention is that racing, without time allowances for anything
else but tonnage - that is, for size - has fostered the fine art of

sailing to the pitch of perfection. Every sort of demand is made
upon the master of a sailing-yacht, and to be penalized in

proportion to your success may be of advantage to the sport itself,
but it has an obviously" target="_blank" title="ad.明显地；显而易见地">obviously deteriorating effect upon the seamanship.

The fine art is being lost.
VIII.

The sailing and racing of yachts has developed a class of fore-and-
aft sailors, men born and bred to the sea, fishing in winter and

yachting in summer; men to whom the handling of that particular rig
presents no mystery. It is their striving for victory that has

elevated the sailing of pleasure craft to the dignity of a fine art
in that special sense. As I have said, I know nothing of racing

and but little of fore-and-aft rig; but the advantages of such a
rig are obvious, especially for purposes of pleasure, whether in

cruising or racing. It requires less effort in handling; the
trimming of the sail-planes to the wind can be done with speed and

accuracy; the unbroken spread of the sail-area is of infinite
advantage; and the greatest possible amount of canvas can be

displayed upon the least possible quantity of spars. Lightness and
concentrated power are the great qualities of fore-and-aft rig.

A fleet of fore-and-afters at anchor has its own slender
graciousness. The setting of their sails resembles more than

anything else the unfolding of a bird's wings; the facility of
their evolutions is a pleasure to the eye. They are birds of the

sea, whose swimming is like flying, and resembles more a natural
function than the handling of man-invented appliances. The fore-

and-aft rig in its simplicity and the beauty of its aspect under
every angle of vision is, I believe, unapproachable. A schooner,

yawl, or cutter in charge of a capable man seems to handle herself
as if endowed with the power of reasoning and the gift of swift

execution. One laughs with sheer pleasure at a smart piece of
manoeuvring, as at a manifestation of a living creature's quick wit

and graceful precision.
Of those three varieties of fore-and-aft rig, the cutter - the

racing rig PAR EXCELLENCE - is of an appearance the most imposing,
from the fact that practically all her canvas is in one piece. The

enormous mainsail of a cutter, as she draws slowly past a point of
land or the end of a jetty under your admiring gaze, invests her

with an air of lofty and silent majesty. At anchor a schooner
looks better; she has an aspect of greater efficiency and a better

balance to the eye, with her two masts distributed over the hull
with a swaggering rake aft. The yawl rig one comes in time to

love. It is, I should think, the easiest of all to manage.
For racing, a cutter; for a long pleasure voyage, a schooner; for

cruising in home waters, the yawl; and the handling of them all is
indeed a fine art. It requires not only the knowledge of the

general principles of sailing, but a particular acquaintance with
the character of the craft. All vessels are handled in the same

way as far as theory goes, just as you may deal with all men on
broad and rigid principles. But if you want that success in life

which comes from the affection and confidence of your fellows, then
with no two men, however similar they may appear in their nature,

will you deal in the same way. There may be a rule of conduct;
there is no rule of human fellowship. To deal with men is as fine

an art as it is to deal with ships. Both men and ships live in an
unstable element, are subject to subtle and powerful influences,

and want to have their merits understood rather than their faults
found out.

It is not what your ship will NOT do that you want to know to get
on terms of successful partnership with her; it is, rather, that

you ought to have a precise knowledge of what she will do for you
when called upon to put forth what is in her by a sympathetic

touch. At first sight the difference does not seem great in either
line of dealing with the difficult problem of limitations. But the

difference is great. The difference lies in the spirit in which
the problem is approached. After all, the art of handling ships is

finer, perhaps, than the art of handling men.
And, like all fine arts, it must be based upon a broad, solid

sincerity, which, like a law of Nature, rules an infinity of
different phenomena. Your endeavour must be single-minded. You

would talk differently to a coal-heaver and to a professor. But is
this duplicity? I deny it. The truth consists in the genuineness

of the feeling, in the genuinerecognition of the two men, so
similar and so different, as your two partners in the hazard of

life. Obviously, a humbug, thinking only of winning his little
race, would stand a chance of profiting by his artifices. Men,

professors or coal-heavers, are easily deceived; they even have an
extraordinary knack of lending themselves to deception, a sort of

curious and inexplicable propensity to allow themselves to be led
by the nose with their eyes open. But a ship is a creature which

we have brought into the world, as it were on purpose to keep us up