all the way occasioned by the fin costs more than the extra drag of rudder which it obviates for just one part of the course.
In steering round a corner a coxswain should bear in mind that he must not expect to see his boat pointing in the direction to which he desires to make. His boat is a tangent to a curve, the curve being the shore. His bows will be pointing to the shore which he is avoiding. It is the position of his midship to the shore which he is rounding that he should especially note, The boat should he brought round as gradually as the severity of the wave will allow. If the curve is very sharp, like the corners of the ‘Gut’ at Oxford, or ‘Grassy’ or Ditton corners at Cambridge, the inside oars should be told to row light for a stroke or two. It will ease their labour, and also that of the gars on the other side.
When there is a stiff beam wind the bows of a racing craft tend to bear wp into the wind’s eye. The vessel is making leeway all the time ; therefore if the coxswain on such an occa- sion steers by a landmark which would guide him were the swater calm, he will before long find himsclf much te leeward of where he should be. In order to maintain his desired course he should humour his boat, and allow her bow to hold up somewhat into the wind (to windward of the landmark which otherwise would be guiding him). To what extent he should do so he must judge for himself, according to circumstances and to his own knowledge of the leeward propensities of his boat. To lay down a hard-and-fast rule on this point would be as much out of place as to attempt to frame a scale of allowance which a Wimbledon rifleman ought to make for mirage or cross- wind, when taking aim at a distant bull’s-eye.
Generally speaking a coxswain should hug the shore when going against tide or stream, and should keep in mid-stream when going with it. (Mid-stream does nat necessarily imply mid-river.)} Over the Henley course, until 1886, a coxwain on the Berks side used to make for the shelter of the bank below Poplar Point, where the stream ran with less force. The altera-
