The _White Squall_ was another handsome clipper, very similar in construction and design to the _Samuel Russell_ and _Oriental_ from the same yard. Although but little more than eleven hundred tons register, this ship cost when ready for sea with one year’s stores and provisions on board the sum of $90,000, and her freight from New York to San Francisco on her first voyage amounted to $70,000. She was commanded by Captain Lockwood, and her measurements were: length 190 feet, breadth 35 feet 6 inches, and depth 21 feet. The _Stag-Hound_, at the time of her launch was the largest merchant ship ever built, though during the nine years that the Cunard Company had been running mail steamers across the Atlantic, the tonnage of American packet ships had steadily increased. In 1846, as we have seen, Donald McKay had built the _New World_ of 1404 tons, and in 1849 William H. Webb launched the _Albert Gallatin_ of 1435 tons, so that the _Stag-Hound_, 1535 tons, was not a very much larger vessel; but she was of a decidedly different design, having less beam and seventeen feet more length than either of these packets. She attracted much attention and many persons came to see her while she was building. A throng estimated at from twelve to fifteen thousand gathered about the shipyard at noon on December 7, 1850, to witness her launch. The weather was bitterly cold, with drift ice in the harbor and snow [Illustration: The “Stag-Hound”] lying deep on the ground. It was feared that the launch might have to be postponed on account of the tallow freezing on the ways, but when she had settled in her cradle and everything was ready, a gang of men came from the forge bearing cans filled with boiling whale oil, which they poured upon the ways. When the word was given to knock away the dog shores, the vessel moved rapidly down the smoking ways and plunged into the gray, icy waters of the harbor, amid shouts and cheers from a shivering crowd, while the bells of Boston rang out mellow and clear, on the calm, frosty air, in welcome to the largest merchant ship afloat.