Transport: Old Girl

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For four years a blunt-nosed, puffinlike paddle steamer has chuffed and tootled around the Isle of Wight, the emeraldy little English-Channel island few miles off the Hampshire coast. Proud was the paddle boat's name: Mauretania. Thus

Cunard White Star Line kept this great name afloat, lest others filch it.

Last week the little regent's day of glory set as the third Mauretania, sleek as a porpoise, eased her 35,700 tons away from the Liverpool docks, glided into New York Harbor 6 days, 18 hours, 57 minutes later.

As much in salutation to the memory of England's well-loved "Old Girl" (scrapped in 1935) as in greeting to her namesake, 2,000 welcomers hallooed, waved, blew whistles, made comparisons. They found the new Mauretania a sturdier but less speedy version of the old, nearly two knots slower (average speed: 20.7 knots); less roomy (1,300 passengers); 13 feet shorter (length overall: 722 feet), but 4,000 tons heavier. Built for comfort, she will never duplicate the speed record of the "Old Girl," who held the mythical Blue Riband 22 years, until Germany's Bremen took it away (Cunard White Star's Queen Mary now holds it).

Aids to the general clack of reminiscence were three passengers who had crossed on the Mauretania's, maiden voyage in 1907: Mr. & Mrs. Robert Middlemass, of Glasgow, Little Businessman Cyrus Morfey, of Herefordshire. All three said they liked the new ship fine.