wet-decked

Updated: June 10, 2025

I afterward learned that this was an old man-of-war's-man's phrase, expressive of the facility with which a sea-officer falls back upon all the severity of his dignity, after a temporary suspension of it. And now, through drizzling fogs and vapours, and under damp, double-reefed top-sails, our wet-decked frigate drew nearer and nearer to the squally Cape. Who has not heard of it?

Herman Melville - White Jacket: or, the World on a Man-of-War