LAMB'S-WOOL SKY. A collection of white orbicular masses of cloud.
LAMBUSTING. A starting with a rope's-end.
LAMPER-EEL. A common corruption of lamprey.
LAMPREY. An eel-like cyclostomous fish, belonging to the genus Petromyzon. There are several species, some marine, others fluviatile.
LAMPRON. The old name for the lamprey.
LAMP-SHELLS. A name applied to the Terebratulæ of zoologists.
LANCE-KNIGHT. A foot-soldier of old.
LANCEPESADO. From Ital. lancia spezzata, or broken lance; originally a soldier who, having broken his lance on the enemy, and lost his horse in fight, was entertained as a volunteer till he could remount himself; hence lance-corporal, one doing corporal's duty, on the pay of a private.
LANCHANG. A Malay proa, carrying twenty-five or thirty men.
LAND. In a general sense denotes terra firma, as distinguished from sea; but, also, land-laid, or to lay the land, is just to lose sight of it.—Land-locked is when land lies all round the ship.—Land is shut in, signifies that another point of land hides that from which the ship came.—The ship lies land to, implies so far from shore that it can only just be discerned.—To set the land, is to see by compass how it bears.—To make the land. To sight it after an absence.—To land on deck. A nautical anomaly, meaning to lower casks or weighty goods on deck from the tackles.