A bunch of rope yarns

by Stanton H. King

It is a doleful sound to hear each man along the rail shouting, “Watch, there, watch!” I once saw the second mate of ship leave the poop, and, running down to the main deck, hustle a fellow along who was slow in getting aft to haul in the lead line. After the lead was aboard he received this warning: “When I say come I want you to run, and when I say run I want you to fly, and when you fly, flap your wings or I’ll make you.” This had a good effect, for before the end of the voyage he lost his easy gait and could “hop light and come a running” as well as any on board.

The hand lead line is between twenty-five and thirty fathoms long, according to the height of vessel from the water, but only the first twenty fathoms are used in sounding. I have seen the planks on the deck of an English square rigger marked for the purpose of measuring a new lead line, but on vessels in which I have sailed this was done with a three-foot rule and a bit of chalk. A good-sized eye is spliced in one end, and after wetting the line it is stretched, measured and then marked. The hand lead line consists of nine marks and eleven deeps. Beginning at two fathoms, a piece of leather with two ends is tucked into the strand of the line, at three fathoms there are three ends of leather; at five fathoms a piece of white calico, at seven a piece of red bunting, at ten a strip of leather with a hole in it, at thirteen a piece of blue cloth, at fifteen a piece of white calico, at seventeen a piece of red bunting, and at twenty fathoms a bit of cord with two knots.

On some lead lines instead of white calico or blue cloth, bunting of the same color is used, but for accurate soundings on a dark night, the leadsman can put the mark in his mouth and with his tongue tell whether it is cloth, calico or bunting, or he may by feeling the marks tell the difference if his fingers are not too cold. The fathoms which are not marked are termed “deeps.” They are 1, 4, 6, 8, 9, 11, 12, 14, 16, 18, 19.

If a sailing ship is in thick fog close to land the officer of the watch may call a man aft and have him take a cast of the hand lead, or he may do it himself, but on some ocean steamers and yachts the lead is in constant use on entering and leaving harbor.

On a war vessel as soon as the ship draws near to the channel the leadsman is at his post. He fastens a large canvas apron to the shrouds of the rigging so that it will hold him as he stretches his body well over on the outside of his ship. The apron reaching to his feet, protects him from the water falling from the line. Making fast one end of the line to a shroud he takes hold of the other end about nine feet from the lead, and then swings the lead backward and forward till there is motion enough for him to swing it over his head two or three times. He must then let it go at the right time, so that it will drop close alongside under the bow. By the time the vessel has reached the place where the lead sunk it has had time to reach the bottom. As the line comes up and down under the leadsman he taps the bottom smartly and shouts the depth of water to the officer on the bridge. If he sees the piece of red bunting on the surface of the water he calls out, “By the mark seven.” If it should be some distance from the water, he uses his judgment and calls “A quarter less seven,” or “And a half six,” “And a quarter six.” Perhaps he feels safe in believing the mark seven is a good fathom from the water and calls “By the deep six,” and so on through the nine marks and eleven deeps, he calls the soundings he receives. Generally the hand lead weighs seven pounds, but when the vessel is going at a good rate of speed a fourteen pound lead is necessary. It requires much practice to become a good leadsman. The starboard leadsman throws the lead with his right hand and the port with his left.

On a certain war vessel we had a seaman who was accustomed to throw the lead from the starboard chains. He was changed to the foretop and his first cast of the lead from the port chains caused a man to go on the sick list for several days. Instead of the lead dropping on the outside of the ship it landed on the starboard side of the forecastle head, falling on the feet of a fireman. It was well the force of the lead was broken by first striking the fish davit or it would have broken the man’s head.

Whenever the apprentices were instructed in casting the lead we took good care to keep out of the way, as there was no telling where the lead would drop, for it might go all over the forecastle head instead of the sea. A good leadsman is a valuable man. A part of the examination a merchant sailor receives when he joins the navy is a cast of the lead.

I recall the first time I saw Lord Kelvin’s (Sir William Thomson,) sounding machine used. I was then on a war vessel. The boatswain’s mate sent me aft to assist the quartermaster in taking a cast of the lead.

This machine consists of about three hundred fathoms of galvanized wire to which is attached a glass tube about fifteen inches long by three quarters of an inch in diameter. This tube contains a secret chemical compound on the principal of the thermometer. To the tube is fastened a rod of small iron called the sinker, which, when sounding takes the tube to the bottom where the density of the water acting on the chemical therein shows when carefully read on the indicator, also attached to the tube, the exact depth of the water.

With the ship going at full speed ahead, the quartermaster, aided by two men to attend the brakes and wind in the wire, it ascertained correctly the depth of one hundred fathoms in less than ten minutes.