The Sailor's Word-Book Part 147

LASCAR. A native sailor in the East Indies; also, in a military sense, natives of India employed in pitching tents, or dragging artillery, as gun-lascars.

LASH. A string, or small cord, forming the boatswain's cat.--_To lash_ or _lace_. To bind anything with a rope or line.

LASH AND CARRY. The order given by the boatswain and his mates on piping up the hammocks, to accelerate the duty.

LASH AWAY. A phrase to hasten the lashing of hammocks.

LASHER. _See_ FATHER-LASHER.

LASHER BULL-HEAD. A name for the fish _Cottus scorpius_.

LASHING. A rope used to fasten any movable body in a ship, or about her masts, sails, and rigging.

LASHING-EYES. Fittings for lower stays, block-strops, &c., by loops made in the ends of ropes, for a lashing to be rove through to secure them.

LASK, TO. To go large.--_Lasking along._ Sailing away with a quartering wind.

LASKETS. Small lines like hoops, sewed to the bonnets and drablers of a sail, to secure the bonnets to the courses, or the drablers to the bonnets.

LAST. A dry measure containing 80 bushels of corn. A cargo. A weight of 4000 lbs. A last of cod or white herrings is 12 barrels. Last, or ship-last, a Swedish weight of 2 tons.

LASTAGE. This is a commercial term for the general lading of a ship. It is also applied to that custom which is paid for wares sold by the last, as herrings, pitch, &c.

LASTER. The coming in of the tide.

LAST QUARTER. _See_ QUARTER, LAST.

LATCH. An old term for a cross-bow; _temp._ Henry VII.--_Lee-latch._ Dropping to leeward of the course.

LATCHES. The same as _laskets_ (which see; also _keys_).

LATCHINGS KEYS. Loops on the head-rope of a bonnet, by which it is laced to the foot of the sail.

LATEEN SAIL AND YARD. A long triangular sail, bent by its foremost leech to a lateen yard, which hoists obliquely to the mast; it is mostly used by xebecs, feluccas, &c., in the Mediterranean. A gaff-topsail, if triangular and set on a yard, is lateen. The term _lateen-rigged_, where sails have short tacks, is wrong. These latter are nothing more or less than clumsy lugs or quadrilaterals. The lateen tack is the yard-arm bowsed amidships.

LATHE. A term for a sort of a cross-bow once used in the fleet.

LATHER, TO. To beat or drub soundly.

LAt.i.tUDE. In wide terms, the extent of the earth from one pole to the other; but strictly it is the distance of any place from the equator in degrees and their parts; or an arc of the meridian intercepted between the zenith of the place and the equinoctial. Geographical lat.i.tude is either northern or southern, according as the place spoken of is on this or that side of the equator. Geocentric lat.i.tude is the angular distance of a place from the equator, as corrected for the oblateness of the earth's form; in other words, it is the geographical lat.i.tude diminished by the angle of the vertical.

LAt.i.tUDE BY ACCOUNT. That estimated by the log-board, and the last determined by observation.

LAt.i.tUDE BY OBSERVATION. The lat.i.tude determined by observations of the sun, star, or moon, by meridional, as also by double alt.i.tudes.

LAt.i.tUDE OF A CELESTIAL OBJECT. An arc of a circle of longitude between the centre of that object and the ecliptic, and is north or south according to its position.

LAUNCE. A term when the pump sucks--from the Danish _lns_, exhausted.

Also, a west-country term for the sand-eel, a capital bait for mackerel.

LAUNCE-GAY. An offensive weapon used of old, but prohibited by statute so far back as 7 Richard II. c. 13.

LAUNCH. The largest or long boat of a ship of war. Others of greater size for gunboats are used by the French, Spaniards, Italians, &c., in the Mediterranean. A launch being proportionably longer, lower, and more flat-bottomed than the merchantman's long-boat, is in consequence less fit for sailing, but better calculated for rowing and approaching a flat sh.o.r.e. Its princ.i.p.al superiority consists in being much fitter to under-run the cable, lay out anchors, &c., which is a very necessary employment in the harbours of the Levant, where the cables of different ships are fastened across each other, and frequently render such operations necessary.

LAUNCH, TO. To send a ship, craft, or boat off the slip on sh.o.r.e into the water, "her native element," as newspapers say. Also, to move things; as, _launch forward_, or _launch aft_. _Launch_ is also the movement by which the ship or boat descends into the water.

LAUNCH-HO! The order to let go the top-rope after the top-mast has been swayed up and fidded. It is literally "high enough." So in pumping, when the spear sucks, this term is "Cease."

LAUNCHING-WAYS. In ship-building, the bed of timber placed on the incline under the bottom of a ship; otherwise called _bilge-ways_. On this the cradles, which are movable vertical sh.o.r.es, to keep the ship upright, slide. Sometimes also termed _bilge-ways_.

LAVEER, TO. An old sea-term for beating a ship to windward; to tack.

LAVER. An edible sea-weed--the _Ulva lactuca_, anciently _lhavan_. From this a food is made, called _laver-bread_, on the sh.o.r.es of S. Wales.

LAVY. A sea-bird nearly as large as a duck, held by the people of the Hebrides as a prognosticator of weather.

LAW OF NATIONS. It was originally merely the necessary law of nature applied to nations, as in the instance of receiving distressed ships with humanity. By various conventional compacts, the Law of Nations became positive; thus flags of truce are respected, and prisoners are not put to death. One independent state is declared incompetent to prescribe to another, so long as that state is innoxious to its neighbours. The Law of Nations consists of those principles and regulations, founded in reason and general convenience, by which the mutual intercourse between independent states is everywhere conducted.

LAX. A term for salmon when ascending a river, on the north coast of Scotland.

LAX-FISHER. A taker of salmon in their pa.s.sage from the sea.

LAY, BY THE. When a man is paid in proportion to the success of the voyage, instead of by the month. This is common in whalers.

LAY, TO. To come or go; as, _lay aloft_, _lay forward_, _lay aft_, _lay out_. This is not the neuter verb _lie_ misp.r.o.nounced, but the active verb _lay_. (_See_ LIE OUT!)

LAY A GUN, TO. So to direct it as that its shot may be expected to strike a given object; for which purpose its axis must be pointed above the latter, at an angle of elevation increasing according to its distance.

LAY-DAYS. The time allowed for shipping or discharging a cargo; and if not done within the term, fair weather permitting, the vessel comes on demurrage. Thus Captain Cuttle--

"A rough hardy seaman, unus'd to sh.o.r.e ways, Knew little of ladies, but much of lay-days."

LAY HER COURSE, TO. To be able to sail in the direction wished for, however barely the wind permits it.

LAY IN. The opposite of _lay out_. The order for men to come in from the yards after reefing or furling. It also applies to manning, or _laying in_, to the capstan-bars.

LAYING OR LYING OUT ON A YARD. To go out towards the yard-arms.

LAYING OR LYING ALONG. Pressed down sideways by a stiff gale.

LAYING A ROPE. Arranging the yarns for the strands, and then the strands for making a rope, or cable.

LAYING DOWN, OR LAYING OFF. The act of delineating the various lines of a ship to the full size on the mould-loft floor, from the draught given.

LAYINGS. A sort of pavement of culch, on the mud of estuaries, for forming a bed for oysters.

LAYING-TOP. A conical piece of wood, having three or four scores or notches on its surface, used in rope-making to guide the lay.