It is necessary that the beams, as represented in the midship-frame, should have a greater height in the middle than at the two ends, to carry the water more readily off from the decks, and to diminish the recoil of the guns, which will thereby more easily return into their places.
The longest of these is called the midship-beam; it is lodged in the midship-frame, or between the widest frame of timbers. At about two thirds of the height from the keel to the lower-deck, are laid a range of beams, to fortify the hold, and support a platform called the orlop, which contains the cables and stores of the ship.
There are usually twenty-four beams on the lower-deck of a ship of seventy-four guns, and to the other decks additional ones in proportion, as the ship lengthens above.
On the Beam, implies any distance from the ship on a line with the beams, or at right angles with the keel: thus, if the ship steers or points northward, any object lying east or west, is said to be on the starboard or larboard beam. Thus also,
Before the Beam, is an arch of the horizon comprehended between the line that crosses her length at right angles, and some object at a distance before it, or between the line of the beam, and that point of the compass which she stems. Thus if a ship, steering west, discovers an island on the right, three points before the beam, the island must bear N W b N from the ship. See the article Bearing.
BEAN-COD, a small fishing-vessel, or pilot-boat, common on the sea-coasts and in the rivers of Portugal. It is extremely sharp forward, having its stem bent inward above into a great curve: the stem is also plated on the fore-side with iron, into which a number of bolts are driven, to fortify it, and resist the stroke of another vessel, which may fall athwart-hause. It is commonly navigated with a large lateen sail, which extends over the whole length of the deck, and is accordingly well fitted to ply to windward.
BEAR-a-hand! a phrase of the same import with make haste, dispatch, quick, &c.
BEARING, in navigation, gissement, an arch of the horizon intercepted between the nearest meridian and any distant object, either discovered by the eye, or resulting from the sinical proportion; as in the first case, at 4 P. M. Cape Spado, in the isle of Candia, bore S by W. by the compass.
In the second, the longitudes and latitudes of any two places being given, and consequently the difference of latitude and longitude between them, the bearing from one to the other is discovered by the following analogy:
As the meridional difference of latitude