EXAMPLES FROM THE WEB FOR CLIPPER
The Sophia was a clipper; and made the run out in a few days.
You'll see this boy on the quarter deck of a clipper one of these days.
If I had an oar or somethin' to steer this clipper with, maybe we could git into shoal water.
Night was drawing near, and the clipper was slipping fast away from us.
Alfred was all of one rainy Sunday reading that copy of the Clipper.
Entering the Clipper office he found Alfred the only person in.
A clipper barque, therefore, is merely a fast-sailing barque.
There are clipper sloops, clipper yachts, clipper ships, etcetera.
One clipper's as good as another if both are sound in the hull and full-rigged.
The clipper "Great Republic" is not freighted half of her time.
WORD ORIGIN
late 14c., "sheepshearer;" early 15c., "a barber;" c.1300 as a surname; agent noun from Middle English clippen "shorten" (see clip (v.1)). The type of fast sailing ship so called from 1823 (in Cooper's "The Pilot"), probably from clip (v.1) in sense of "to move or run rapidly," hence early 19c. sense "person or animal who looks capable of fast running." Perhaps originally simply "fast ship," regardless of type:
The early association of the ships was with Baltimore, Maryland. Perhaps influenced by Middle Dutch klepper "swift horse," echoic (Clipper appears as the name of an English race horse in 1831). In late 18c., the word principally meant "one who cuts off the edges of coins" for the precious metal.