This beautiful ship was one of the finest and most successful of all the iron wool clippers, and as a specimen of an iron sailing ship she could hardly be beaten, either for looks, speed or sea worthiness. Barclay, Curle never turned out a more graceful and handsome ship as looks; and like all Carmichael’s, she was most beautifully sparred, crossing the main skysail yard, which was so characteristic a feature of their ships. I give her spar plan below. _SPAR PLAN OF MERMERUS._ +----------------------+-----------+-----------+-----------+ | Spars | Fore | Main | Mizen | +----------------------+-----------+-----------+-----------+ |Masts—deck to truck | 156 feet| 161 feet| 135 feet | |Lowermast | 64 ft. | 68 ft. | 56 ft. | |Doubling | 16½ ft. | 16½ ft. | 14 ft. | |Topmast | 57 ft. | 57 ft. | 48 ft. | |Doubling | 11 ft. | 11½ ft. | 10 ft. | |Topgallant mast | 32 ft. | 32 ft. | 26 ft. | |Royal mast | 17 ft. | 17½ ft. | 15 ft. | |Skysail mast | 13½ ft. | 13½ ft. | 12½ ft. | |Lower yard | 87 ft. | 88 ft. | 73½ ft. | |Lower topsail yard | 74½ ft. | 76 ft. | 62 ft. | |Upper topsail yard | 73 ft. | 73½ ft. | 60 ft. | |Lower topgallant yard | 57½ ft. | 60 ft. | 52 ft. | |Upper topgallant yard | 56 ft. | 56 ft. | 45 ft. | |Royal yard | 44 ft. | 44 ft. | 32 ft. | |Skysail yard | | 32 ft. | | +---------------+------+-----------+-+---------+-----------+ |Jibboom 72 ft. |Spanker boom 55 ft. | Spanker gaff 37 ft. | +---------------+--------------------+---------------------+ This is her original spar plan. Barclay, Curle planned her spars for three skysails, but the fore and mizen were not sent aloft. _Mermerus_ had a poop 54 feet long, and a foc’s’lehead 32 feet long. She carried a cargo of 10,000 bales of wool, representing the fleeces of a million sheep and worth £130,000 more or less as wool varied in price. She never made a bad voyage under the Golden Fleece house-flag, and the regularity with which she arrived every year in time for the February wool sales caused her to receive the most out-spoken praise. On one occasion, when as usual she had arrived in time and several notable ships had missed the sales, Mr. Young, of the Australian Mortgage Land and Finance Company, greeted one of the Carmichaels in Cornhill with the heart-felt remark:—“That ship of yours is the most satisfactory ship in the wool trade.” Most of those connected with the _Mermerus_ regarded her with great affection and spoke of her as a living thing. Mr. John Sanderson, a well-known Melbourne merchant, was often heard to say:—“The _Mermerus_ is a wonderful ship, I can always depend on the _Mermerus_.”