"On the 1st of July, 1849, lumber was selling at San Francisco for $500 per 1000 feet. A better quality of lumber could be purchased in New York for $12--in Maine for $10." (Ex. Doc. 2, 32 Cong. 1 sess. p. 306.) At the same time, (Phil. Quar. Reg., Dec. 1849), eggs were selling as high as $2 a dozen, hens for $4 each, butter at $1.50 a pound, and potatoes, by the pound, 6 to 8 cents; turnips and cabbages still higher. The merchants made haste to forward the needed supplies; thousands of eager gold-hunters sought passage on the outbound ships, and the one demand of the merchant and the passenger was for speed. The number of ships obtainable being inadequate, the merchants went to the shipyards, and it was then that the most famous of all the American clippers were built. The records of some of the old ships that were at once put into the California trade were not bad. The _Colonel Fremont_ reached San Francisco after a passage of 127 days, and the _Grey Eagle_ in 117. But the _Flying Cloud_, built by Donald McKay of Boston, and sailed by Captain Josiah P. Creesy, of Marblehead, in 1851, made the passage in 89 days, and in one day covered 374 sea miles. The length of this passage is given as 84 days in some accounts, but _A Description of the New Clipper Great Republic_, a pamphlet printed at Eastburn's Press, Boston, in 1853, for Donald McKay, says the time was 89 days. This pamphlet also says that the outlook for profits led McKay to build the _Sovereign of the Seas_, a ship of 2400 tons, and then the largest, longest, and sharpest merchant ship in the world. "Contrary to the advice of his best friends, he built her on his own account; he embarked all he was worth in her, for no merchant in this vicinity would risk capital in such a vessel, as she was considered too large and costly for any trade.... To the surprise of even those who knew him best, he played the merchant and loaded her himself. And well he was rewarded. He not only sold her on his own terms, but her performances exceeded his expectations." Captain Lachlan McKay, brother of Donald, commanded this famous clipper. In August, 1851, she left New York for San Francisco, and until well beyond the Horn made record speed; but off Valparaiso, while the captain was driving her through a gale by night, an extra heavy squall carried away her fore and main topmasts. Captain McKay was sitting in an arm-chair on the quarter-deck at the time, and that chair was his only bed for the next two weeks. During that time new masts were made and got on end, the yards were crossed and sail was made. She reached San Francisco in 102 days from New York in spite of the disaster.