We have seen in the development of our subject that it was only after many centuries that the accommodation of the passenger aboard ship was ever considered. We have noticed how the ship was built primarily not for speed, but for carrying the maximum of cargo with the greatest safety. But now there comes into our story the desire for speed as the dominating factor, far more important than any other consideration, and it is in the clipper ships that we get the first merchant vessels that were constructed to cross the seas with the utmost despatch. It is to North America that this is due. Whilst our bluff, dignified, heavy East Indiamen were slowly making their last voyages before the China monopoly was to come to an end, a remarkable ship, built by her owner regardless of cost, was to appear in Baltimore. This was the _Ann McKim_, of 493 registered tons. This flush-decked vessel came out in 1832. She was very fast, but had small carrying capacity, and was the first clipper ship ever built, and having regard to the daring improvement which America had made in frigates and privateers, it is not surprising that this fast type of merchant ship should come from the same country. The contrast, indeed, between the old East Indiamen and the young clippers is exactly what exists between the Old World and the New. Convention was put aside, shipbuilders thought out problems for themselves and had the courage to put their convictions into hulls. But the first real out-and-out clipper ship was the _Rainbow_, which was launched at the beginning of 1845 in New York. She was a 750-ton vessel with hollow lines at the bows, and her greatest breadth much further aft than had been thought practicable. When constructed, she turned out to be a handsome vessel, exceptionally quick, and she was the fastest vessel in the world. But after trading some time out to China, she was lost in 1848, probably off Cape Horn. Now the cause of attraction towards China at first was the trade in opium. It is not to the credit of British, American or Parsee firms that this pernicious drug was imported into China, where it had been declared illegal by the Government as far back as 1796; but this illicit trade certainly did much to develop fast-sailing ships.