[Page 52], l. 10.
The windlass is a large cylindrical piece of timber used in merchant ships to heave up the anchors: it is furnished with strong iron pauls to prevent it from turning back by the efforts of the cable, when charged with the weight of the anchor, or strained by the violent jerking of the ship in a tempestuous sea. As the windlass is heaved about in a vertical direction, it is evident that the effort of an equal number of men acting upon it will be much more powerful than on the capstan. It requires, however, some dexterity and address to manage the handspec, or lever, to the greatest advantage; and to perform this the sailors must all rise at once upon the windlass, and, fixing their bars therein, give a sudden jerk at the same instant; in which movement they are regulated by a sort of song pronounced by one of the number. The most dexterous managers of the handspec, in heaving at the windlass, are generally supposed to be the colliers of Northumberland; and of all European mariners, the Dutch are certainly the most awkward and sluggish in this manœuvre.
[Page 53], l. 14.
The stately ship they tow.
From the Saxon teohan. Towing is chiefly used, as in the present instance, when a ship for want of wind is forced toward the shore by the swell of the sea.
[Page 53], l. 19, 20.
Now swelling stud-sails on each side extend,
Then stay-sails sidelong to the breeze ascend.
1. Stud, or studding-sails, called by the French Banettes en etui, are light sails, which are extended in moderate breezes beyond the skirts of the principal sails: where they appear as wings upon the yard-arms. 2. Stay-sail; though the form of sails is so extremely different, they may all be divided into sails which have either three or four sides: a stay-sail comes under the first class, and receives its name from a large strong rope on which it is hoisted, called a stay, employed to support the mast, by being extended from its upper end towards the fore part of the ship, as the shrouds (a range of large ropes), are extended to the right and left of the mast, and behind it. The yards of a ship are said to be square, when they hang across the ship, at right angles, with the mast; and braced, when they form greater or lesser angles with the ship’s length.