COLONNATI. The Spanish pillared dollar.
COLOURABLE. Ships' papers so drawn up as to be available for more purposes than one. In admiralty law, a probable plea.
COLOUR-CHESTS. Chests appropriated to the reception of flags for making signals.
COLOURS. The flags or banners which distinguish the ships of different nations. Also, the regimental flags of the army. Hauling down colours in token of submission, and the use of signals, are mentioned by Plutarch in Themistocles.
COLOUR-SERGEANT. The senior sergeant of a company of infantry; he acts as a kind of sergeant-major, and generally as pay-sergeant also to the company. From amongst these trustworthy men, the sergeants for attendance on the colours in the field were originally detailed.
COLT. A short piece of rope with a large knot at one end, kept in the pocket for starting skulkers.
COLUMBIAD. A name given in the United States to a peculiar pattern of gun in their service, principally adapted to the firing of heavy shells: its external form does not appear to have been the result of much science, and it is now generally superseded by the Dahlgren pattern.
COLUMN. A body of troops in deep files and narrow front, so disposed as to move in regular succession.
COLURES. Great circles passing through the equinoctial and solstitial points, and the poles of the earth.
COMB. A small piece of timber under the lower part of the beak-head, for the fore-tack to be hauled to, in some vessels, instead of a bumkin: it has the same use in bringing the fore-tack on board that the chess-tree has to the main-tack. Also, the notched scale of a wire-micrometer. Also, that projecting piece on the top of the cock of a gun-lock, which affords the thumb a convenient hold for drawing it back.