United States or Lesotho ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
I then led a party forward, and got the fore and main stay-sails on the ship. To these were added the mizen stay-sail, the only other piece of canvass we could show, until the top-masts were fidded.
To get the ship under way as quickly as possible, the novice had only to make use of, that is, to counter-brace, the foresail. The blacks had easily helped him in that maneuver. The question now was to get under full sail, and, to complete the sails, to hoist the top-sails, the royal, the fore-staff, and the stay-sails.
However, we got the top-gallant-sails down, with most of the stay-sails, and the mizen-topsail aback; but finding we still outsailed him, I had no other method left but that of sheering across his hawse, first on one bow, then on the other, raking him as we crossed, always having in view the retarding his way, by obliging him either to receive us athwart his bowsprit, in which case we should have turned his head off shore, or to sheer as we did.
That being done, we hove up the anchor, warped up to, and weighed the kedge, and proceeding round the point under our stay-sails; there anchored with the best bower in twenty fathoms; and moored with the other bower, which lay to the north, in thirteen fathoms. In this position we were shut in from the sea by the point above-mentioned, which was in one with the extremity of the inlet to the east.
The fore-sail and fore and mizzen stay-sails were on the ship, and the main-sail, close-reefed also, was about to be set, to drag her-from the mêlée of her foes, when her ensign came down. By getting the tack of the latter aboard, and the sheet aft, he would have all the canvass set the gale would allow, and to this all-essential point he directed his wits.
The Dane had been a seaman of the old school; and, instead of the more modern spenser, his ship had been fitted with old-fashioned stay-sails. Of these it was possible to bend the main and mizzen stay-sails in tolerable security, provided the ends of the halyards could be got down.
Between these two masts, on the stays which support them at the prow, a triple row of triangular sails may be set. Finally, at the prow, on the bowsprit, and its extreme end, were hauled the three jibs. The jibs, the brigantine, the fore-staff, and the stay-sails are easily managed.
"The wind came on towards the afternoon to blow harder and harder; and by nightfall you know it gets dark as soon as the sun goes down in those latitudes we had to shorten sail so much that the Cranky Jane was staggering along at the rate of nearly fourteen knots an hour with reefed top-sails and jib and main-sail besides the stay-sails.
The rest of his speech was unheard, for another flash cut the darkness, followed by the thud of a big gun, the shot coming as it were instantly upon the waiter's question; but it had no effect upon the brig, which came nearer and nearer to the pier-like wharves of the harbour, glided round again with the two stay-sails rilling upon the other tack, and then went off once more.
Top-sail, royal, stay-sails, would add sensibly to the schooner's speed, and Dick Sand resolved to set them. This operation would be more difficult than the others, not for the stay-sails, which could be hoisted, hauled aboard and fastened from below, but for the cross-jacks of the foremast.
Word Of The Day