stock-and-fluke

Updated: May 21, 2025

"We are in no condition to sport with stock-and-fluke; have every thing ready to let go at a word; and see the grapnels ready, we will throw them aboard the smuggler as we close, and take him alive. Once fast to the chain, we are yet strong enough to haul him in under our scuppers, and to capture him with the pumps! Is the signal still abroad, for a pilot?"

James Fenimore Cooper - The Water-Witch or, the Skimmer of the Seas