The Sailor's Word-Book Part 170

NAKHADAH, OR NACODAH. An Arab sea-captain.

NAME. The name of a merchant ship, as well as the port to which she belongs, must be painted in a conspicuous manner on her stern. If changed, she must be registered _de novo_, and the old certificate cancelled.

NAME-BOARD. The arch-board, or part whereon the ship's name and port are painted.

NAME-BOOK. The Anglo-Saxon _nom-boc_, a mustering list.

NANCY. An east-country term for a small lobster.

NANCY DAWSON. A popular air by which seamen were summoned to grog.

NANKIN. A light fawn-coloured or white cotton cloth, almost exclusively worn at one time in our ships on the India station. It was supplied from China, but is now manufactured in England, Malta, and the United States.

NANT. A brook, or small river, on the coasts of Wales.

NAPHTHA. A very inflammable, fiercely burning fluid, which oozes from the ground or rock in many different localities, and may be obtained by the distillation of coal, cannel, and other substances. It is nearly related to _petroleum_ (which see), and is used for lighting, combustible, and various other purposes.

NAPIER'S BONES. Small rods, arranged by Lord Napier to expedite arithmetical calculations. In _Hudibras_:

"A moon-dial, with Napier's bones, And several constellation stones."

NARKE. A ray of very wonderful electric powers.

NARROWING OF THE FLOOR-SWEEP. For this peculiar curve, _see_ HALF-BREADTH OF THE RISING.

NARROWS. The most confined part of a channel between two lands, or any contracted part of a navigable river.

NARWHAL. The _Monodon monoceros_, an animal of the cetacean order, found in the Arctic seas, and distinguished by the single long pointed tusk projecting straight forward from its upper jaw, whence it is also termed sea-unicorn.

NATURAL FORTIFICATION. Those obstacles, in the form or nature of the country, which impede the approaches of an enemy.

NATURAL MOTION. A term applied to the descending parabolic curve of a shot or sh.e.l.l in falling.

NAUFRAGIATE, TO. An old expression, meaning to suffer shipwreck. It occurs in Lithgow's _Pilgrime's Farewell_, 1618.

NAULAGE. A freight or fare.

NAUMACHIA. An artificial piece of water whereon the ancient Romans represented a sea-fight, supposed to have originated in the first Punic war.

NAUROPOMETER. An instrument for measuring the amount of a ship's heel or inclination at sea.

NAUSCOPY. The tact of discovering ships or land at considerable distances.

NAUTICAL. Relating to navigation, sailors, or maritime affairs in general.

NAUTICAL ALMANAC. A book of the first necessity to navigators. (_See_ EPHEMERIS.)

NAUTICAL a.s.sESSORS. Persons of nautical experience appointed to a.s.sist the judge of the admiralty and other courts in technical difficulties.

NAUTICAL ASTRONOMY. That part of the celestial science which treats of the planets and stars so far as relates to the purposes of navigation.

NAUTICAL DAY. This day commences at noon, twelve hours before the civil day, and ends at noon of the day following. (_See_ DAY.)

NAUTICAL MILE (MEAN) = 60756 feet.

NAUTICAL STARS. About 72 of the brightest, which have been selected for determining the lat.i.tude or the longitude, by lunar distances, and inserted, corrected to the year, in the Nautical Ephemeris.

NAUTICAL TABLES. Those especially computed for resolution of matters dependent on nautical astronomy, and navigation generally.

NAUTIc.u.m FNUS. Marine usury; bottomry.

NAUTILUS. The pearly nautilus, _N. pompilius_, is a marine animal, belonging to the same cla.s.s (_Cephalopoda_) as the cuttle-fish, but protected by a beautiful, chambered, discoid sh.e.l.l. The paper-nautilus (_Argonauta argo_) belongs to a different family of the same cla.s.s, and has a simple, delicate, boat-like sh.e.l.l.

NAVAL. Of or belonging to a ship, or, as now commonly adopted, to the royal navy; hence, naval stores, naval officers, &c.

NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. The construction, or art and science, of building ships.

NAVAL ARMAMENT. A fleet or squadron of ships of war, fitted out for a particular service.

NAVAL CADET. _See_ CADET.

NAVAL HOSPITALS. Greenwich is styled by eminence _the Royal Hospital_, yet the naval medical establishments in England and the colonies are all royal. At home they are Haslar, Plymouth, Yarmouth, Haulbowline, Chatham, and Woolwich; abroad, Malta, Jamaica, Halifax, Bermuda, Cape of Good Hope, and Hong Kong. Besides these useful hospitals, there are other stations of relief around the coasts.

NAVAL OFFICER. One belonging to the royal navy. Also, the person in charge of the stores in a royal dockyard abroad.

NAVAL RESERVE. A body of volunteers, consisting of coasters and able merchant seamen, who are drilled for serving on board our ships of war in case of need. They receive a fixed rate of compensation, become ent.i.tled to a pension, and enjoy other privileges. They are largely officered from their own body.

NAVAL SCIENCE. A knowledge of the theory of ship-building, seamanship, navigation, nautical astronomy, and tactics.

NAVAL STORES. All those particulars which are made use of, not only in the royal navy, but in every other kind of navigation. There are various statutes against stealing or embezzling them.

NAVAL STORE-SHIP. A government vessel, appropriated to carrying stores and munitions of war to different stations.

NAVAL TACTICS. The warlike evolutions of fleets, including such manuvres as may be judged most suitable for attack, defence, or retreat, with precision. The science of tactics happens never to have proceeded from naval men. Thus Pere la Hoste among the French, and a lawyer among the English, are the prime authorities. Moreover, it is a fact well known to those who served half a century back, when Lord Keith, Sir P. Durham, Sir P. Malcolm, and B. Hallowell practised their squadrons, that questions remained in dispute and undecided for at least sixteen years.

NAVE-HOLE. The hole in the centre of a gun-truck for receiving the end of the axle-tree.

NAVEL HOODS. Those hoods wrought above and below the hawse-holes, outside a ship, where there are no cheeks to support a bolster.

NAVEL LAVER. The sea-weed _Ulva umbilicus_.

NAVEL LINE. _See_ LINE.

NAVIGABLE. Any channel capable of being pa.s.sed by ships or boats.

NAVIGANT. An old word for sailor.

NAVIGATION. The art of conducting vessels on the sea, not only by the peculiar knowledge of seamanship in all its intricate details, but also by such a knowledge of the higher branches of nautical astronomy as enables the commander to hit his port, after a long succession of bad weather, and an absence of three or four months from all land. Any man without science may navigate the entire ca.n.a.ls of Great Britain, but may be unable to pa.s.s from Plymouth to Guernsey.