CLAMPS. Pieces of timber applied to a mast or yard, to prevent the wood from bursting. Also, thick planks lying fore and aft under the beams of the first orlop or second deck, the same as the rising-timbers are to the deck. They are securely fayed to all the timbers, to which they are fastened by nails through the clamp, and penetrating two-thirds of the thickness of the timbers. Also, substantial strakes, worked inside, on which the ends of the beams rest. Also, smooth crooked plates of iron forelocked upon the trunnions of cannon; these, however, are more properly termed cap-squares. (See [Carriage].) Also, any plate of iron made to open and shut, so as to confine a spar. A one-cheeked block; the spar to which it is fastened being the other cheek.—To clamp, is to unite two bodies by surfaces or circular plates.—Clamped, is when a piece of board is fitted with the grain to the end of another piece of board across the grain.
CLAMS. Strong pieces used by shipwrights for drawing bolts, &c. Also, a kind of forceps used for bringing up specimens of the bottom in sounding; a drag. (See [Clam].)
CLANG. The rattling or clashing of arms.
CLAP-BOARD [German, klapp-bord]. An east-country commercial plank, which ought to be upwards of 13 feet in length; cask-staves are also clap-boards. Clap-board, in the colonies, is the covering the side of a house with narrow boards, "lapping fashion," in contradistinction to shingling, or tiling, or clench-built.
CLAP-MATCH. A sort of seal, distinct from the fur-seal.
CLAP ON! The order to lay hold of any rope, in order to haul upon it. Also, to "Clap on the stoppers before the bitts," i.e. fasten the stoppers; or, "Clap on the cat-fall," i.e. lay hold of the cat-fall.—To clap a stopper over all, to stop a thing effectually; to clap on the stopper before the bitts next to the manger or hawse-hole; to order silence.—To clap in irons, to order an offender into the bilboes.—To clap on canvas, to make more sail.
CLAPPER. A name for the valve of a pump-box. Also, a plank or foot-bridge across a running stream; also, the clapper of a bell.
CLAP-SILL. The lockage of a flood-gate.
CLARTY. In north-country whalers, used for wet, slippery.
CLASHY. Showery weather.