Unfortunately for _Wild Deer_ she remained under the command of Captain Smith for several more voyages, during which she was not allowed to show her paces and usually arrived home in such a condition that Captain Sellers, the ship’s-husband (a good old name for the present day shore superintendent) used to declare that she was a disgrace to the Albion fleet. However, on Captain Smith’s death Captain Cowan had her for two voyages, carrying emigrants to New Zealand; on Cowan leaving her to take the _Wellington_ from the stocks, Captain Kilgour, who had been mate in her, was given command, and in 1881-2 she came home from Otago in 82 days, arriving on 30th January. Then Captain Kerr had her; this man had been carpenter of the _Peter Denny_ years before, and mate of the _Christian McCausland_, one of Henderson’s first iron ships. He was a very steady man, but no sailor. On 12th January, 1883, when outward bound with emigrants, he piled the poor old _Wild Deer_ up on North Rock, Cloghy, County Down, and she became a total loss. Duncan’s Method of Taking in Sail. It may be of interest, perhaps, to describe the method used by Duncan, the crack racing mate of _Ariel_, _Titania_, and _Wild Deer_, when taking in sail. For a topgallant sail he sent as many men as were available to the lee buntline and leachline; one hand, generally an apprentice, stood by the clewline, and another attended to the weather brace. Duncan himself would ease away a few feet of the halliards, then sing out:—“Let go your lee sheet!” Away would fly the sheet, followed by Duncan letting go the halliards; the hands on the buntline and leachline hauling away for all they were worth, the yard would run down and round itself in so that the boy on the weather brace only had to take in the slack. With smart hands on bunt and leachlines, the lee side of the sail would be spilt and up on the yard before it was well down and the apprentice on the clewline had only to get in the slack and make it fast. The lee side of the sail being well up, there was no trouble with the weather side. A hand in the top was almost unnecessary as the lee sheet needed no lighting up—it did that itself quick enough. The success of this method, of course, depended on the smartness of the hands on the bunt and leachline, but there were not many indifferent sailormen in a tea clipper’s foc’s’le. In taking in a course Duncan used to man the lee bunt and leachlines well, with two hands only on the clew garnet; on the sheet being eased away bunt and leachlines were hauled smartly in, the sail was at once spilt and hauled up to the yard without a flap, the slack of the clew garnet being rounded up; then there was no trouble with the weather side. This is also the method advocated by Captain Basil Hall in his _Fragments of Voyages_. Everything depended, of course, on having the necessary beef on the bunt and leachlines. “Peter Denny.”