Page:The Clipper Ship Era.djvu/12

 vi were made in regard to the laws governing the winds and currents of the ocean; and this knowledge, together with improvements in model and rig, enabled sailing ships to reduce by forty days the average time formerly required for the outward and homeward voyage from England and America to Australia.

In pursuing this narrative we shall see the stately, frigate-built Indiaman, with her batteries of guns and the hammocks stowed in nettings, disappear, and her place taken by the swift China, California, and Australian clippers, which in their turn, after a long and gallant contest, at last vanish before the advancing power of steam.

Many of the clipper ships mentioned in this book, both American and British, were well known to me; some of the most celebrated of the American clippers were built near my early home in Boston, and as a boy I saw a number of them constructed and launched; later, I sailed as an officer in one of the most famous of them, and as a young sea-captain knew many of the men who commanded them. I do not, however, depend upon memory, nearly all the facts herein stated being from the most reliable records that can be obtained. So far as I am aware, no account of these vessels has ever been written, beyond a few magazine and newspaper articles, necessarily incomplete and often far from accurate; while most of the men who knew these famous ships have now passed away. It seems proper, therefore, that some account of this remarkable era should be recorded by one who has a personal knowledge of the most exciting portion