Bargain Barkentine

For $1 a year, the U.S. Navy had chartered as handsome a yacht as there is in the world. The square-rigged auxiliary barkentine Sea Cloud, in time of peace, supplied Mr. & Mrs. Joseph E. Davies with the kind of transportation they liked best. Last week, at a Baltimore dock, awed workmen were busy removing the Davies' doodads to prepare the Sea Cloud for service in the Coast Guard.

When the Sea Cloud was built at Kiel in 1931, at a cost variously estimated at $1,000,000 to $3,500,000, she was known as the Hussar; Mrs. Davies was then Mrs. Edward F. Hutton. When Mrs. Hutton changed her name to Davies, she changed Hussar to Sea Cloud, went off on her for a honeymoon in the Caribbean.

From bowsprit to stern, the Sea Cloud measures 310 ft. She has a bulk of 2,323 gross tons, carries 36,000 sq. ft. of canvas on her four towering masts. Below decks are four diesel engines which can boost her along at 14 knots. Under sail, she can step up her speed to 16 knots. But it was not such figures that awed the roustabouts in Baltimore; it was the fantastic elegance of her fittings.

There were bathrooms of pink marble with gold-plated washbasins; bedrooms done in beige and peach with four-posters decorated with petit-point insets. The smoking room sported a collection of trophies, including the stuffed heads of rhinos and antelopes, and a couple of completely stuffed turtles. A brace of stuffed trophies cheered the sick bay. Besides a suite for Mrs. Davies' daughter, Nedenia, there were staterooms for Mr. & Mrs. Davies, sleeping accommodations for 14 guests.

The Sea Cloud used to carry a crew of 75. Last week the skeleton crew that remained aboard sadly recalled the days when the gulls in the Sea Cloud's wake got so glutted with garbage that they had no energy left to squawk.

Not for two years has the Sea Cloud put to sea. On her last voyage, she brought Mr. Davies (then Ambassador to Belgium) and his wife home from Antwerp. Before that, when Mr. Davies was Ambassador to Russia, the yacht was moored in Leningrad's harbor. Before he took the Sea Cloud to Communist Russia, Mr. Davies was somewhat fearful that such capitalist swank might trouble the proletarian waters. He said as much to Russian Foreign Minister Molotov. "Of course, bring her over," said Molotov. "But would she be safe from sabotage?" persisted Mr. Davies. "Sabotage?" said Mr. Molotov. "Why, she'd be safer here from sabotage than she would be in New York harbor." No sabotage occurred.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.