NOTES.

PAGE 17, 1. 14.

A shipboy on the high and giddy mast!
"Wilt thou, upon the high and giddy mast,
Seal up the shipboy's eyes, and rock his brains,
In cradle of the rude imperious surge?"

PAGE 30, 1. 1.

O'er bar, and shelve.

SHAKSPEARE.

A bar is known, in hydrography, to be a mass of earth, or sand, that has been collected by the surge of the sea, at the entrance of a river, or haven, so as to render navigation difficult, and often dangerous. A shelf, or shelve, so called from the Saxon Schylf, is a name given to any dangerous shallows, sandbanks, or rocks, lying immediately under the surface of the water.

PAGE 37, 1. 19.

And lo! the shore with mournful prospects crown'd. Alluding to the ever memorable siege of Candia, in 1669. PAGE 52, 1. 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 handspike, 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 handspike, 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 manoeuvre.

PAGE 53, 1. 2. 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, 1. 19, 20.

Now swelling studsails on each side extend,
Then staysails sidelong to the breeze ascend.

1. Stud, or studdingsails, 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 yardarms. 2. Staysail; though the form of sails is so extremely different, they may all be divided into sails which have either three or four sides: a

staysail 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.

PAGE 54, 1. 3.

The pilots now their Azimuth attend.

The magnetical Azimuth, a term which astronomers have borrowed from the Arabians, is the apparent distance of the sun from the north or south point of the compass; and this is discovered, by observing with an azimuth compass, when the sun is ten or fifteen degrees above the horizon.

PAGE 54, 1. 22.

White as the clouds beneath the blaze of noon.

Before the art of coppering ships' bottoms was discovered, they were painted white. The wales are the strong flanks which extend along a ship's side, at different heights, throughout her whole length, and form the curves by which a vessel appears light and graceful on the water: they are usually distinguished into the mainwale, and the channel wale.

PAGE 58, 1. 7.

Deep blushing armours all the tops invest.

In our largest merchantmen, the tops, or platforms, which

surround the heads of the lower mast (for every ship's mast, taken in its apparent length, consists of the lower mast, the topmast, and topgallant mast), are fenced on the aft, or hinder side, by a rail of about three feet high, stretching across, supported by stanchions; between which, a netting is usually constructed, the outside of which was formerly covered with red baize, or canvass painted red, and was called the top armour; being a sort of blind against the enemy for the men who were there stationed. This name is now nearly lost, and the netting is always covered with black canvass.

NOTES ON THE SECOND CANTO.

PAGE 66, 1. 20.

And the dark scud in swift succession flies.

The scud is a name given by seamen to the lowest and lightest clouds, which are swiftly driven along the atmosphere by the winds.

PAGE 66, 1, 22.

Low in the wave the leeward cannon lie.

When the wind crosses a ship's course, either directly or obliquely, that side of the ship upon which it acts is termed the weather side; and the opposite one, which is then pressed downwards, is termed the lee side; all on one side of her is accordingly called to windward, and all on the opposite side to leeward: hence also are derived the lee cannon, the lee braces, weather braces, &c.

PAGE 66, 1. 24; and PAGE 67, 1. 2.

Topsails, reef, blocks.

Topsails are large square sails, of the second magnitude and height; as the courses are of the first magnitude, and the lowest.-Reefs are certain divisions of the sail, which are taken in or let out in proportion to the increase or diminution