KNITTLE. See [Nettles].
KNOB, or Knobbe. An officer; perhaps from the Scotch term knabbie, the lower class of gentry.
KNOCKER. A peculiar and fetid species of West Indian cockroach, so called on account of the knocking noise they make in the night.
KNOCK OFF WORK and Carry Deals. A term used to deride the idea of any work, however light, being relaxation; just as giving up taking in heavy beams of timber and being set to carry deals, is not really knocking off work.
KNOLL. The top of a rounded hill; the head of a bank, or the most elevated part of a submarine shoal. [Perhaps derived from nowl, a provincialism for head.]
KNOPP. See [Knap].
KNOT. A large knob formed on the extremity of a rope, generally by untwisting its ends, and interweaving them regularly among each other; of these there are several sorts, differing in form, size, and name, as diamond knot, kop knot, overhand knot, reef knot, shroud knot, stopper knot, single wall knot, double wall knot. The bowline knot is so firmly made, and fastened to the cringles of the sails, that they must break, or the sails split, before it will slip. (See [Running Bowline].) The sheepshank knot serves to shorten a rope without cutting it, and may be presently loosened. The wall-knot is so made with the lays of a rope that it cannot slip, and serves for sheets, tacks, and stoppers. Knots are generally used to act as a button, in preventing the end of a rope from slipping through the hole of a dead-eye, or through the turns of a laniard, by which they are sometimes made fast to other ropes.—Knot also implies a division on the log line, bearing a similar proportion to a mile, which half a minute does to an hour; that is, it is 1⁄120 of a mile; hence we say, the ship was going 8 knots, signifying 8 miles per hour. Indeed, in nautical parlance, the words knot and mile are synonyms, alluding to the geographical mile of 60′ to a degree of latitude.
KNOWL. A term commonly given to the summits of elevated lands in the west of England, therefore probably the same as knoll.
KNOWLEDGE. In admiralty law, opposed to ignorance, and the want of which is liable to heavy penalty.
KNUCKLE. A sudden angle made on some timbers by a quick reverse of shape, such as the knuckles of the counter-timbers.