Contemporary artists of the early nineteenth century have left for us paintings showing some of the North Sea packet ships. Turner’s well-known picture in the National Gallery of the English packet arriving in Calais in 1803 is an instance. These craft were never bigger than about eighty tons, and during the French wars ran for a time between Yarmouth and Hellevoetsluis in Holland. But a West Indian packet such as the _Duke of Marlborough_ with her 1804 tons and brig-rigged, was a very different sort of ship. And in the very year when Commodore Dance put Admiral Linois to flight, this packet ship, whilst bound for the Leeward Islands, was in the month of April chased by a schooner and captured. [Illustration: CAPTAIN W. ROGERS, Of the “Windsor Castle” packet. About 1808. CAPTAIN JOSEPH HUDDART, F.R.S., Who served in the H.E. India Company’s service for ten years. He lived 1741-1816, and was a celebrated hydrographer. (_By courtesy Messrs. T. H. Parker._)] As mentioned in the last chapter, the famous American packets which ran from New York to Liverpool, came out in 1816. This famous Black Ball Line was for years the pioneer, and began with five 400-ton ships. During the first ten years these vessels averaged twenty-three days on the eastward and forty-three days on the westward voyage, the fastest eastward being the passage of _Canada_ in fifteen days eighteen hours. These ships were flush-decked. Between the foremast and mainmast was the galley, and in the long-boat were carried the sheep and pigs and fowls for the ship’s food. A cow was also carried in a house over the main hatch, and the passengers’ cabins were aft. These liners carried a black ball painted on the foresail and were commanded by real hard-case captains who had caused much anxiety to British shipping whilst in command of privateers during the war of 1812. In these ships passengers, mails and bullion were conveyed, two vessels leaving each month. In 1821 two more lines were started, one of which was the Red Star Line of packets to Liverpool. After the Dramatic Line was founded in 1836 the packet ships gradually increased to about 1000 tons, and the competition had become keener, packets now running from North America to Liverpool, Havre and London. Captain A. H. Clark, in his interesting volume The _Clipper Ship Era_, states that all packet ships carried a white light at the bowsprit cap from sunset to sunrise; but of course side-lights had not yet come in. It is interesting to remark in this connection that probably the first institution of side-lights was in 1834, for from January 1 the City of Dublin Steam Company began to use a white light at the foremast head, a red on the larboard bow and a white on the starboard bow, the two latter being attached to the houses forward of the paddleboxes. Then for a few years there was a diversity in practice, each company doing what it thought best in this respect to minimise risk of collision at sea.