“Were
you ever on a smack?”
I asked her soft and low;
She
dropped her eyes, looked out to sea,
Then shook her tresses “no”.
“Was
never on a smack,” she said,
With coyness fair to see;
“For
all of that, I wouldn’t mind,
A little smack on me.”
June
28, 1895
Pub.
B. Courier,
Sept.
22, ‘95
A smack was a traditional
fishing boat used off the coast of Britain and the Atlantic coast of
America for most of the 19th century and, in small numbers, up to the Second
World War. Many larger smacks were originally cutter rigged sailing
boats until about 1865, when smacks had become so large that cutter main
booms were unhandy. The smaller smack retain the gaff cutter rig. The larger
smacks were lengthened and re-rigged and new ketch-rigged smacks were
built, but boats varied from port to port. Some boats had a topsail on
the mizzen mast, while others had a bowsprit carrying a jib. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smack_(ship)
Calm in Gloucester
Harbor, by Carlton Theodore Chapman, ca 1890, shows American fishing smacks (Brooklyn
Museum)
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