The main-sail and fore-sail of a ship are furnished with a tack on each side, which is formed of a thick rope tapering to the end, having a knot wrought upon the largest extremity, by which it is firmly retained in the clue of the sail: by this means the tack is always fastened to windward, at the same time that the sheet extends the sail to leeward.
[Page 69], l. 13.
... the bunt-lines gone!
Bunt-lines are ropes fastened to the bottoms of the square sails to draw them up to the yards, when the sails are brailed or furled.
[Page 69], l. 19.
... and yards to starboard braced.
A yard is said to be braced, when it is turned about the mast horizontally, either to the right or left: the ropes employed in this service are called the larboard and starboard braces.
[Page 69], l. 23, 24; and [Page 70], l. 1, 2.
Brails, head-ropes, robands.
Brails: a general name given to all the ropes which are employed to haul up, or brail the bottoms, and lower corners of the great sails. A rope is always attached to the edges of the sails, to strengthen and prevent them from rending: those parts of it which are on the perpendicular or sloping edges, are called leech ropes, that, at the bottom, the foot rope, and that on the top, or upper edge, the head-rope. Robands, or rope bands, are small pieces of rope, of a sufficient length to pass two or three times about the yards, in order to fix to them the upper edges of the respective great sails: the robands for this purpose are passed through the eyelet holes under the head-rope.