HATCH, or HATCHWAY, ecoutille, a square or oblong opening in the deck of a ship, of which there are several, forming the passages from one deck to another, and into the hold, or lower apartments. See the Deck, plate [III]. where A represents the main-hatchway of the lower deck; N N, the fore-hatchway; and O O, the after-hatchway.
There are likewise hatches of a smaller kind, called scuttles. See U U in the same figure, as also the article Scuttle.
Hatches is also, although improperly, a name applied by sailors to the covers or lids of the hatchways.
To HAUL, haler, an expression peculiar to seamen, implying to pull a single rope, without the assistance of blocks, or other mechanical powers: when a rope is otherwise pulled, as by the application of tackles, or the connection with blocks, &c. the term is changed into bowsing. See also the articles Bowse, Hoist, and Rowsing.
To Haul the wind, venir an vent, to direct the ship’s course nearer to that point of the compass from which the wind arises. Thus supposing a ship sailing south-west, with the wind northerly, and some particular occasion renders it necessary to haul the wind farther to the westward; to perform this operation it is necessary to arrange the sails more obliquely with her keel; to brace the yards more forward, by slackening the starboard, and pulling in the larboard braces, and to haul the lower sheets farther aft: and finally, to put the helm a-port, i. e. over to the larboard side of the vessel. As soon as her head has turned directly to the westward, and her sails are trimmed accordingly, she is laid to have hauled the wind four points, that is to say, from S. W. to W. She may still go two points nearer to the direction of the wind, by disposing her sails according to their greatest obliquity; or, in the sea-phrase, by trimming all sharp: and in this situation she is said to be close-hauled, as sailing W. N. W. See the articles Close-hauled and Sailing.
HAUSE, or HAWSE, is generally understood to imply the situation of the cables before the ship’s stem, when she is moored with two anchors out from forward, viz. one on the starboard, and the other on the larboard bow. Hence it is usual to say, She has a clear hause, or a foul hause. It also denotes any small distance a-head of a ship, or between her head and the anchors employed to ride her; as, “He has anchored in our hause;” the “brig fell athwart our hause,” &c.
A ship is said to ride with a clear hause, when the cables are directed to their anchors, without lying athwart the stem; or crossing, or being twisted round each other, by the ships winding about, according to the change of the wind, tide, or current.
A foul hause, on the contrary, implies that the cables lie across the stem, or bear upon each other, so as to be rubbed and chafed by the motion of the vessel.
The hause accordingly is foul, by having either a cross, an elbow, or a round turn. If the larboard cable, lying across the stem, points out on the starboard side, while the starboard cable at the same time grows out on the larboard side, there is a cross in the hause. If, after this, the ship, without returning to her former position, continues to wind about the same way, so as to perform an entire revolution, each of the cables will be twisted round the other, and then directed out from the opposite bow, forming what is called a round turn. An elbow is produced when the ship stops in the middle of that revolution, after having had a cross: or, in other words, if she rides with her head northward with a clear hause, and afterwards turns quite round so as to direct her head northward again, she will have an elbow. See the articles Elbow and Riding.
Hause-holes, ecubiers, certain cylindrical holes cut through the bows of a ship on each side of the item, through which the cables pass in order to be drawn into, or let out of the vessel, as occasion requires. They are represented by d d in fig. 10. plate [IV]. being fortified on each side by the