In the South Seas and other places the natives still use catamarans and proas which are really nothing but two logs fastened together, and yet the most efficient and safest of life rafts used by our greatest steam ships are merely modifications of these same cata marans. The purpose of any boat is to ?oat and support its occupants while traveling across the water, and while it seems a far cry from the coracle or the dugout to a palatial steamship or a stately, four-masted, sailing ship, yet the principle of each is identical and each serves the purpose for which it was designed equally well; it is merely a matter of improvement, and many of the terms and names Of parts which were used by the earliest sailors are still retained on our greatest liners and largest sailing vessels.