Harry Sucher Rowing Skiff

From the book "Simplified Boatbuilding, The Flatbottom Boat"

Pete Culler Sailing Skiff

Duckboat

I love small boats. I love the justness of their shapes formed by the requirements of their uses, the laws of water flow, and the eye of their designers. And so I collect boat books. My newest, found through biblio.com, is Edson I. Schock's How to Build Small Boats. Well worth the few dollars it cost, just in the enjoyment I've had looking over the very well printed plans of the 12 boats he details. The power boats are old fashioned but wholesome. The sailboats look great -- these are small, shallow vee bottom plywood catboats and sloops. But the boat that I'm currently obsessing about is the 11'3" duckboat.

Here it is:   http://www.dngoodchild.com/7849.htm

I don't hunt ducks. I don't hunt. But I like this boat. It's a flat-bottomed double ender. Probably meant for sheltered water only, though it looks like it could be pretty safe -- decked and with a high coaming, but too flat and wide to handle waves well. As designed it would be pretty heavy, probably over 100 lbs, but could be lightened considerably using modern construction and thinner plywood. I do think it needs to be durable for its original use. The oarlocks are on the coaming and don't have much spread -- you might be rowing cross handed even with 6-foot oars. I can live with that and such a short boat is not going to be very fast anyway.

So, this boat, but without all the oak pieces, and with plywood reduced to 1/4", fiberglass the bottom for abrasion resistance. Maybe cut down the coaming a bit? Foam floatation bow and stern, and a little under the side decks. Aim for 75 lbs and a rooftop load for the truck. We'll see.

Asphodel, That Greeny Flower

BOOK 1

Of asphodel, that greeny flower,
        like a buttercup,
                        upon its branching stem--
save that it's green and wooden--
        I come, my sweet,
                        to sing to you.
We lived together
        A life filled, 
                        If you will,
with flowers, so that
        I was cheered
                        When I first came to know
that there were flowers also
        in hell.
                        Today
I'm filled with the fading memory of those flowers
        that we both loved,
                        even to this poor
colorless thing--
        I saw it--
                        when I was a child--
little prized among the living
        But the dead see,
                        asking among themselves:
What do I remember
        That was shaped
                        as this thing is shaped?
while our eyes
        fill with tears.
                        Of love, abiding love
it will be telling
        though too weak a wash of crimson
                        colors it
to make it wholy credible.
        There is something
                        something urgent
I have to say to you
        and you alone
                        but it must wait
while I drink in
        the joy of your approach,
                        perhaps for the last time.

To a Conscript of 1940

Qui n'a pas une fois désespéré de l'honneur, ne sera jamais un héros.
Georges Bernanos

A soldier passed me in the freshly fallen snow
His footsteps muffled, his face unearthly grey;
And my heart gave a sudden leap
As I gazed on a ghost of five-and-twenty years ago.

I shouted Halt! and my voice had the old accustom'd ring
And he obeyed it as it was obeyed
In the shrouded days when I too was one
Of an army of young men marching

Into the unknown. He turned towards me and I said:
`I am one of those who went before you
Five-and-twenty years ago: one of the many who never returned,
Of the many who returned and yet were dead.

We went where you are going, into the rain and the mud;
We fought as you will fight
With death and darkness and despair;
We gave what you will give—our brains and our blood.

We think we gave in vain. The world was not renewed.
There was hope in the homestead and anger in the streets
But the old world was restored and we returned
To the dreary field and workshop, and the immemorial feud

Of rich and poor. Our victory was our defeat.
Power was retained where power had been misused
And youth was left to sweep away
The ashes that the fires had strewn beneath our feet.

But one thing we learned: there is no glory in the deed
Until the soldier wears a badge of tarnish'd braid;
There are heroes who have heard the rally and have seen
The glitter of garland round their head.

Theirs is the hollow victory. They are deceived.
But you my brother and my ghost, if you can go
Knowing that there is no reward, no certain use
In all your sacrifice, then honour is reprieved.

To fight without hope is to fight with grace,
The self reconstructed, the false heart repaired.'
Then I turned with a smile, and he answered my salute
As he stood against the fretted hedge, which was like white lace.


Herbert Read

'When You See Millions Of The Mouthless Dead'

When you see millions of the mouthless dead
Across your dreams in pale battalions go,
Say not soft things as other men have said,
That you'll remember. For you need not so.
Give them not praise. For, deaf, how should they know
It is not curses heaped on each gashed head?
Nor tears. Their blind eyes see not your tears flow.
Nor honour. It is easy to be dead.
Say only this, 'They are dead.' Then add thereto,
'Yet many a better one has died before.'
Then scanning all the o'ercrowded mass, should you
Perceive one face that you loved heretofore,
It is a spook. None wears the face you knew.
Great death has made all his for evermore.

Charles Hamilton Sorley

All The Hills And Vales Along

All the hills and vales along
Earth is bursting into song,
And the singers are the chaps
Who are going to die perhaps.
       O sing, marching men,
       Till the valleys ring again.
       Give your gladness to earth’s keeping,
       So be glad, when you are sleeping.

Cast away regret and rue,
Think what you are marching to.
Little live, great pass.
Jesus Christ and Barabbas
Were found the same day.
This died, that went his way.
       So sing with joyful breath.
       For why, you are going to death.
       Teeming earth will surely store
       All the gladness that you pour.

Earth that never doubts nor fears,
Earth that knows of death, not tears,
Earth that bore with joyful ease
Hemlock for Socrates,
Earth that blossomed and was glad
’Neath the cross that Christ had,
Shall rejoice and blossom too
When the bullet reaches you.
       Wherefore, men marching
       On the road to death, sing!
       Pour your gladness on earth’s head,
       So be merry, so be dead.

From the hills and valleys earth
Shouts back the sound of mirth,
Tramp of feet and lilt of song
Ringing all the road along.
All the music of their going,
Ringing, swinging, glad song-throwing,
Earth will echo still, when foot
Lies numb and voice mute.
       On, marching men, on
       To the gates of death with song.
       Sow your gladness for earth’s reaping,
       So you may be glad, though sleeping.
       Strew your gladness on earth’s bed,
       So be merry, so be dead.

Charles Hamilton Sorley

In Flanders, the Battle of Loos continued. Among those killed on October 13 [1915],in an attack on the Hohenzollern Redoubt, was the twenty-year-old poet Charles Sorley ... Sorley's body was never found.
The First World War, A Complete History -- Sir Martin Gilbert