“The character of the crew shipped necessitated the precautions; for the day previous to the ship’s sailing men had to be searched for and found in the lowest haunts and were brought on board drugged and under the influence of liquor, and placed below the hatches. We, the passengers, heaved up the anchor and worked the ship generally until outside of Port Phillip Head, when the men confined below, who were to compose the crew, were brought on deck, looking dazed and confused, any resistance or remonstrance on their part being futile. But those amongst them that were able-bodied seamen were paid in gold, forty sovereigns down, on signing the ship’s articles for the homeward voyage. “Amongst them were useless hands and some of a very indifferent character. Some, no doubt, were escaped convicts, or men who had secreted themselves to evade the police and law; others deserters from ships then laying in the Bay--about forty in all, and in general appearance a very unprepossessing lot. However, there being no help for it, we had but to keep guarded and prepared against the worst; the ship’s passengers together with the officers numbering about twenty hands. The captain was an old and well-known sailor of high reputation and long experience; and the ship was well found and provisioned, in anticipation of a long voyage--which it proved to be, extending over four months from the time we left Port Phillip Head until she reached the English coast.” The first clipper ship constructed for the Australian trade was the _Marco Polo_, of 1622 tons; length 185 feet, breadth 38 feet, depth 30 feet. She was built in 1851 by Smith & Co., at St. John, N. B., for James Baines & Co., Liverpool, and was the pioneer clipper of the famous Australian Black Ball Line. The _Marco Polo_ was constructed with three decks, and was a very handsome, powerful-looking ship. Above her water-line, she resembled the New York packet ships, having painted ports, and a full-length figurehead of the renowned explorer whose name she bore. Below water she was cut away and had long, sharp, concave ends. Her accommodations for saloon and steerage passengers were a vast improvement upon anything before attempted in the Australian trade. She sailed from Liverpool for Melbourne, July 4, 1851, commanded by Captain James Nicol Forbes, carrying the mails and crowded with passengers. She made the run out in the then record time of 68 days, and home in 74 days, which, including her detention at Melbourne, was less than a six months’ voyage round the globe. Running her easting down to the southward of the Cape of Good Hope, she made in four successive days 1344 miles, her best day’s run being 364 miles. Her second voyage to Melbourne was also made in six months out and home, so that she actually sailed twice around the globe within twelve months. To the _Marco Polo_ and her skilful commander belongs the credit of setting the pace over this great ocean race-course round the globe.