She had a 20-foot mast stepped on one of the crossbeams connecting the hulls, with a single gaff sail.

Their masts rake forward and not aft, which enables them to swing gaff, sail, and sheet round in front of the mast when they come about, instead of keeping the sheet aft and dipping the butt of the gaff with the sail to the other side of the mast, which would be an impossibility for that rig, as the butt of their enormous mainyard or gaff is bowsed permanently down in the bows, while the soaring peak may be nearly a hundred feet above the water.

The crew of the Nautilus sent up a tremendous cheer as the great spar came down with its gaff sail, leaving the schooner for the time like a bird with a broken wing.

Burgess the mate went forward, to stand for a few minutes looking into the offing, before going back aft to say a word or two to the man at the wheel, as the schooner was now gliding rapidly on, and then walked sharply to where the skipper was giving orders to the men, which resulted in a big gaff sail being run up, to balloon out and increase the schooner’s rate of speed through the water.