This race started like all the other races each year, with all the crack tea clippers lined up to load tea. They were moored in tiers off Hongkew, along with SIR LANCELOT, UNDINE, ARGONAUT, DOUNE CASTLE, TAITSING and THYA TIRA.

The first thing is the loading of the clipper. Today cargo is just thrown into a vessel's hold, since they can use their water tanks to ballast the ship. In those days, a stevedore demanded a lot of skill to load and stiffen the tea cargo just right to obtain the best trim for the vessel in question. In the case of the tea clippers, the Captain settled the issue. The green clipper (THERMOPYLAE) only loaded 1,196,400 pounds of tea instead of her usual 1,390,000. CUTTY SARK also took in a lighter load than was her custom her cargo weighing 1,303,000 pounds instead of 1,375,364.

As soon as the cargo came down tea lighters surrounded each ship, for they were loaded in the stream. Thus, the first part of the race, to see who would be the first away, was on. Sweating coolies, standing on stages, rigged along the CUTTY SARK'S black and THERMOPYLAE'S green sides, hove the chests aboard to their mates in the holds amidst a continual sing-song of guttural Chinese chanting.

It was hot, steamy, SW monsoon weather, with sharp bursts of rain alternating with a damp fog, so that sail bending was left to the very last minute. CUTTY SARK was the first to finish loading, the last chest being hurled aboard on the afternoon of June 17th. She got under way at 5 p.m., and dropped down as far as Halfway Point, where she had to bring up for the night.

THERMOPYLAE put the tarpaulins on her hatches some time after dark that same night. The Woosung bar was crossed by both vessels the following morning, CUTTY SARK being in the lead, and the beautiful SIR LANCELOT, on her way to Foochow, was also in company.

This could have been the start of a wonderful race home between all three ships, but the weather spoiled it all. By nightfall of the 18'b, the fog was so thick that the pilots required all three ships to anchor close to the lightship. On the 19'h they made some progress down the Yangtze estuary but were again required to anchor due to fog. This was again repeated on the 20th! Fortunately, the weather cleared enough on the 21st for them to make sail, having dropped off their pilots. The fog came on again about noon, but this did not stop them and they lost sight of each other. The CUTTY SARK and THERMOPYLAE did not see each other again until I p. m. on June 26th , when abreast of Hong Kong.

The wind was then very light from the SW; THERMOPYLAE came up on CUTTY SARK's port quarter. Both ships hoisted their ensigns, there being a lot of excitement on both ships. Captain Moodie, of the CUTTY SARK, became like a bear with a sore head as he watched the green clipper slowly creeping up on him. This was not too surprising, as the THERMOPYLAE was undoubtedly the faster ship in light winds. By sundown the THERMOPYLAE was hull down on the CUTTY SARK'S port bow.

It must have been a hectic night in the squally, uncertain monsoon weather. His officers declared that Captain Kemball was so nervy and pnickety that life was hardly worth living aboard the green clipper. And we may be sure that is was no better aboard the CUTTY SARK. There is nothing more trying or irritating to the nerves than racing under sail. On such occasions of concentrated excitement even the most self-controlled give way to heated words.

The CUTTY SARK seems to have sailed better at night than she did during the day, or else her officers were more wide-awake than those of the green clipper, for when daylight broke on the 27th THERMODPYLAE was once more hull down on the CUTTY's port quarter.

But once again the CUTTY SARK had to endure the irritating experience of seeing their rival creeping closer and closer, and what was harder to bear, eating out to windward. It was typical S. W. monsoon weather, with masses of heavy, rain-filled clouds piled up in the sky like so many mountain ranges.

Out of these at times came tearing squalls, through which the racing craft had to be carefully luffed, with a tremendous flogging of canvas and clatter of blocks. This was followed after a few minutes with rain in sheets, the wind being snuffed out to a faint air.

This was THERMOPYLAE's weather; and before the end of the afternoon watch she was once more out on the CUTTY's starboard bow, six miles to the S.S.W. of her, having come right through the weather. All through the night of the 28th the wind was light. The following morning the racing ships, with THERMOPYLAE leading, passed to leeward of the Macclesfield shoals; and as soon as the Egeria Bank, the easternmost limit of these reefs was astern, each ship came round in turn on to the port tack and headed in for the Cochin China coast.

The night of the 29th the wind was almost calm, but on the 30th the wind came away again strong and squally from the S.S.W., "a dead muzzler". To the delight of the CUTTY SARK, when last seen at about noon the THERMOPYLAE bore north.

The two clippers did not meet again until July 15th. CUTTY SARK was abreast of Direction Island, off the coast of Borneo, when THERMOPYLAE was sighted about eight miles N.N.W.

The wind was very light indeed from the eastward, and to the satisfaction of Captain Moodie, and his eager crew, the green clipper not only failed to gain, but slowly dropped astern. However, at daybreak on the 16th she was still in sight astern; and as soon as the racers hauled their wind for the Stolze's Channel, Gaspar Strait, she began to gain steadily, the wind, such as it was, being S.E. and right in their teeth. The narrow channel was entered early on the 17th, and all day CUTTY SARK and THERMOPYLAE were beating through with the wind slowly freshening from E.S.E. Though THERMOPYLAE gained appreciably in the short tacking, she was still well astern when CUTTY SARK passed Shoalwater Island at I I p.m.

On the 18th, the wind, though still ahead, was very unsteady, with violent squalls followed by short spells of calm when the flapping of sails was all that gave the vessels headway. CUTTY SARK was still leading when a slice of bad luck robbed her of the satisfaction of being the first to make her number off Anjer.

A crop of waterspouts, with their attendant whirlwinds, appeared right in her course, and she was compelled to take in sail and run away to leeward. And when she hauled to the wind again, there was her rival nicely placed upon her weather bow!

Thus, at 6 a.m. on the 19th THERMOPYLAE ran past Anjer with her number flying, having a lead of one and one half miles on the CUTTY SARK. The weather in the Sunda Strait was so fluky and baffling, calms alternating with airs all round the compass, that noon on the 20th found the two racers within three miles of each other.

The race, owing to the CUTTY SARK'S misfortune, ended in the green clipper's favor; but the honors went to the loser, which, after carrying away her rudder on August 15th and laying hove-to for a whole week while a jury-rudder was being fitted, towed up the Thames on October 18th, only just a week behind her rival.