If the wind has got round upon the other bow, and it is too late for box-hauling, square the yards fore and aft, keeping your helm so as to pay her off under sternway; and, as the sails fill, keep the after yards shaking, and haul up the spanker and mainsail, squaring the head-yards, and shifting your helm as she gathers headway.
Chappelling.—This operation is performed when, instead of coming to, you are taken aback in light winds. Put the helm up, if she has headway, haul up the mainsail and spanker, and square the after yards. Shift the helm as she gathers sternway, and when the after sails fill, and she gathers headway, shift your helm again. When she brings the wind aft, brace up the after yards, get the main tack down and sheet aft, and haul out the spanker as soon as it will take. The head braces are not touched, but the yards remain braced as before. The former mode of wearing, by squaring the head-yards when the after sails are full, has great advantages over chappelling, as the vessel will go off faster when the wind is abeam and abaft, and will come to quicker when the wind gets on the other side.
Broaching-to.—This is when a vessel is scudding, and comes up into the wind and gets aback. For such an accident, the foretopmast staysail is set, which will act as an off-sail, so that by keeping the helm up, with the maintopsail (if set) braced into the wind, she will pay off again without getting sternway. If the close-reefed foretopsail is carried instead of the main, it can be easily filled.
Brought by the Lee.—This is when a vessel is scudding with the wind quartering, and falls off so as to bring the wind on the other side, laying the sails aback. This is more likely to occur than broaching-to, especially in a heavy sea. Suppose the vessel to be scudding under a close-reefed maintopsail and reefed foresail, with the wind on her larboard quarter. She falls off suddenly and brings the wind on the starboard quarter, laying all aback. Put your helm hard a-starboard, raise fore tack and sheet, and fill the foresail, shivering the maintopsail. When she brings the wind aft again, meet her with the helm, and trim the yards for her course.
CHAPTER XIII.
ACCIDENTS.
On beam-ends. Losing a rudder. A squall. A man overboard. Collision. Rules for vessels passing one another.
On Beam-Ends.—A vessel is usually thrown upon her beam-ends by a sudden squall taking her, when under a press of sail, and shifting the ballast. She must be righted, if possible, without cutting away the masts. For, beside sacrificing them, the object can seldom be accomplished in that way, if the ballast and cargo have shifted. Carry a hawser from the lee quarter, with spars and other good stop-waters bent to it. As the ship drifts well to leeward, the hawser will bring her stern to the wind; but it may not cast her on the other side. If a spring can be got upon the hawser from the lee bow, and hauled upon, and the stern fast let go, this will bring the wind to act upon the flat part of the deck and pay her stern off, and assist the spring, when the sails may be trimmed to help her in righting. If she can be brought head to the wind, and the sails be taken aback, she may cast on the other tack. When there is anchoring ground, the practice is to let go the lee anchor, which may take the sails aback and cast her. Then the ballast and cargo may be righted.
If there is no anchoring ground, a vessel may still be kept head to the wind, by paying a chain cable out of the lee hawse-hole; or by bending a hawser to a large spar, which may be kept broadside-to by a span, to the centre of which the hawser is bent. The same operation may be applied to a vessel overset, and is preferable to wearing by a hawser. Make fast the hawser forward to the lee bow, carry the other end aft to windward and bend it to the spar, and launch the spar overboard. By this means, or by letting go an anchor, though there be no bottom to be reached, a vessel may often be recovered.