WATER-PLOUGH. A machine formerly used for taking mud and silt out of docks and rivers.
WATER-SAIL. A save-all, or small sail, set occasionally under the lower studding-sail or driver-boom, in a fair wind and smooth sea.
WATER-SCAPE. A culvert, aqueduct, or passage for water.
WATER-SHED. A term introduced into geography to denote the dividing ridges in a hilly country. In geology, it implies that the water is shed thence naturally, by the inclination, to the valley base. As regards nautical men in search of water, it is therefore expedient to look for the depressed side of the strata.
WATER-SHOT, or Quarter-shot. When a ship is moored, neither across the tide, nor right up and down, but quartering between both.
WATER-SHUT. An old name for a flood-gate.
WATER-SKY. In Arctic seas, a dark and dull leaden appearance of the atmosphere, the reflected blue of the sea indicating clear water in that direction, and forming a strong contrast to the pale blink over land or ice.
WATER-SNAKES. A group of snakes (Hydrophis), whose habitat is the sea. Some of them are finely coloured, and generally very like land-snakes, except that their tails are broader, so as to scull or propel them through the water.
WATER-SPACE. The intervening part between the flues of a steamer's boiler.
WATER-SPOUT. A large mass of water collected in a vertical column, and moving rapidly along the surface of the sea. As contact with one has been supposed dangerous, it has been suggested to fire cannon at them, to break the continuity by aërial concussion. In this phenomenon, heat and electricity seem to take an active part, but their cause is not fully explained, and any facts respecting them by observers favourably placed will help towards further researches into their nature. (See [Whirlwind].)