CHAPTER II.

SKATE SAILS.

The duties of the secretary, as defined in the constitution which Dutchy
Van Syckel drew up, were to keep a record of all the acts of the society,
the minutes of every meeting, and accurate detailed descriptions of all
work accomplished. Therefore, while the rest of the society was busy
cutting up old sheets, levied from the surrounding neighborhood, and
sewing and rigging the sails under Bill's direction, I, with pad and
pencil in hand, took notes on all the operations.



The Double Swedish Sail.

Bill evolved some new types of sails which differed materially from the
type described in the first chapter. One was a double sail--"the kind
they use in Sweden," he explained. One of the sheets which the foraging
party brought in was extra large; it measured approximately two yards and
a half square. This was folded on itself, making a parallelogram seven
feet six inches long and three feet nine inches wide. The sheets we had
were all rather worn and some were badly torn, so that we had to make our
sails of double thickness, sewing patches over the weak spots. A broad hem
was turned down at each end, and heavy tape was sewed on, leaving loops as
before, to attach them to the spars. This reduced the length of our sail
to seven feet three inches. The end spars were spaced apart by a light
pole about ten feet long, to which they were tied at the points of
intersection. The spars were also braced by halyards looped over the ends