The uniquely American character of Minnehaha (from the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Museum) appropriately adorned the uniquely American McKay clipper ship named for her. T he loathed Orlando, in fac t, loves Rosalind, who ques tions "Is his H ead worth a H at? O r his C hin wo rth a Beard ?" In response Orlando festoons the fo rest with affectionate words for beautiful Rosalind, and eventually wins a better life and her hand. Spain 's Miguel de Cervantes penned Don Quixote in 1604 and its instant success continues to this day as we still care for the knigh t-errant who courageously duels a windmill in his ques t to honor Dulcinea. An 1868 Medfo rd-built ship named Don Quixote carried a plate-armored Don Q uixo te figurehead, now housed at the Sjofartmuseet in Gothenburg, Sweden. More contemporary figures also made their way onto ships' bows. In 1790, Robert Burns wrote the poem Tam o 'Shanterat the reques t of antiquarian Captain Francis Grose, whose interest was the W itches M eetings at Aloway Church. In it, Burns imagines that after drinking in to th e night with fri ends, T am o'Shanter begins his dark ride home alone, crooning as he goes. See ing a witch dancing in the churchya rd dressed only in a short-tailed shirt (cur ry sark in Sco ttish), T am yells so mething drunkenly appreciative; although the witch angrily fli es after him, she is only able to
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yank the tail off his ho rse just before he gallops across a bridge. Tam is safe on the other side, knowing that witches cannot cross running wate r. T his white witch was represented on the 1869 D umbar ton-built tea clipper Cutty Sark in G reenwich, England; a co py of the fig urehead is on the ship while the ori ginal is d isplayed inside the vessel. Burns himself is the subject of a very nice little bust figurehead o n display at the Smithsonian's National M useum ofAmerican H istory. W hil e the attribute of a book, seen in his left hand, might be expected for an author, in fact many fi gureheads of the 1800s hold books. T hey may represe nt poetry or popul ar novels as often as they represent the Bible, th e more usual interpretation. Clearly figureheads fro m li teramre do not have to be from a story with a maritime theme, as evidenced by the exo tically beautiful Lalla Rookh fro m a Liverpool tea clipper of 1856. T he boo k Lalla Rookh was written in 18 17 by T homas M oore and reprinted th ro ugh out the 1800s. Lalla Rookh is a beautiful , intelligent and pampered Indian princess traveling overland fro m her Delhi home to the "enchanting valley of Cash mere," where she will marry the prince of Bucharia. T he journey of many days is made more pleasant by specially planted gardens and well-placed art wo rks on view for her travel ing party, and a poet named Feram orz has been provided to tell entertaining stories. She falls in love
with Feramorz and, in the happy ending, learns he is, afte r all, the very prin ce she is to marry. W hile the 1856 fi gurehead is preserved in the C utty Sark Collection, a later, equally elaborate Lalla Rookh fi gurehead is presumably lost. Sh e was on the iron bark Lalla Rookh, built in Liverpool in 1876 and reported in a photo capti on in Sea Breezes (Sept. 1925) as "recently sold to shipbreakers." Lo rna D oo ne, the heroine of British author Richard D oddridge Blac kmore's 1869 ro mance of the same name, was co mmemorated in the name of an 1876 Dundee schooner. T he Harmony (ex Lorna Doone), as illustrated in Sea Breezes 70 (1 925), still carried a ve ry stylish female figurehead w hich one may assume is original to Lorna Doone rather than chosen by the schoo ner's later owners, the Moravian C hurch and Mission Agency, which used her to carry stores and miss ionaries between London and Labrador. Although called the "yo ung queen of wealth and beauty" in the Victorian novel, Lo rna has virtually no voice. More often she is spoken of by the action hero John Ridd as the ideal of "perfect loveliness ." T he event-filled novel Lorna Doone, in continuous print since 1869, may interest the 2 1st-century reader for the wo rld the Victorian lady inhabits. Crossing the Atlantic, American H enry Wadswo rth Longfellow's poem The Song ofHiawatha tells of the prophet Hiawatha who is to bring peace to the warring Indian nations. Although the scroll-skirt style of
The figurehead ofthe white witch carries the tail of Tam o 'Shanter's horse- her only prize from a fatile chase. A copy greets visitors to the clipper C utty Sark in England, while the original can be seen belowdecks.
SEA HISTORY 101 , SUMMER 2002