BAARD. A mediæval transport.

BAARE-Y-LANE. The Manx or Gaelic term for high-water.

BAAS. An old term for the skipper of a Dutch trader.

BAB. The Arabic for mouth or gate; especially used by seamen for the entrance of the Red Sea, Bab-el-mandeb.

BABBING. An east-country method of catching crabs, by enticing them to the surface of the water with baited lines, and then taking them with a landing net.

BABBLING. The sound made by shallow rivers flowing over stony beds.

BAC. A large flat-bottomed French ferry-boat. In local names it denotes a ferry or place of boating.

BACALLAO [Sp.] A name given to Newfoundland and its adjacent islands, whence the epithet is also applied to the cod-fish salted there.

BACCHI. Two ancient warlike machines; the one resembled a battering-ram, the other cast out fire.

BACK. To back an anchor. To carry a small anchor ahead of the one by which the ship rides, to partake of the strain, and check the latter from coming home. —To back a ship at anchor. For this purpose the mizen top-sail is generally used; a hawser should be kept ready to wind her, and if the wind falls she must be hove apeak.

—To back and fill. To get to windward in very narrow channels, by a series of[66] smart alternate boards and backing, with weather tides. —To back a sail. To brace its yard so that the wind may blow directly on the front of the sail, and thus retard the ship's course. A sailing vessel is backed by means of the sails, a steamer by reversing the paddles or screw-propeller.

—To back astern. To impel the water with the oars contrary to the usual mode, or towards the head of the boat, so that she shall recede. —To back the larboard or starboard oars. To back with the right or left oars only, so as to round suddenly. —To back out.

(See Back a Sail. ) The term is also familiarly used for retreating out of a difficulty. —To back a rope or chain, is to put on a preventer when it is thought likely to break from age or extra strain. —To back water. To impel a boat astern, so as to recede in a direction opposite to the former course.

—Backing the worming. The act of passing small yarn in the holidays, or crevices left between the worming and edges of the rope, to prevent the admission of wet, or to render all parts of equal diameter, so that the service may be smooth. —Wind backing. The wind is said to back when it changes contrary to its usual circuit. In the northern hemisphere on the polar side of the trades, the wind usually changes from east, by the south, to west, and so on to north.

In the same latitudes in the southern hemisphere the reverse usually takes place. When it backs, it is generally supposed to be a sign of a freshening breeze.

BACK. The outside or convex part of compass-timber. Also a wharf.

BACK, of a Ship. The keel and kelson are figuratively thus termed.

BACK, of the Post. An additional timber bolted to the after-part of the stern-post, and forming its after-face.

BACK-BOARD. A board across the stern sheets of a boat to support the back of passengers; and also to form the box in which the coxswain sits.

BACK-CUTTING. When the water-level is such that the excavation of a canal, or other channel, does not furnish earth enough for its own banks, recourse is had to back-cutting, or the nearest earth behind the base of the banks.

BACK-FRAME. A vertical wheel for turning the three whirlers of a small rope-machine.

BACK-HER. The order, in steam-navigation, directing the engineer to reverse the movement of the cranks and urge the vessel astern.

BACKING. The timber behind the armour-plates of a ship.

BACK-O'-BEYOND. Said of an unknown distance.

BACK OFF ALL. The order when the harpooner has thrown his harpoon into the whale. Also, to back off a sudden danger.

BACK-ROPE. The rope-pendant, or small chain for staying the dolphin-striker. Also a piece long enough to reach from the cat-block to the[67] stem, and up to the forecastle, to haul the cat-block forward to hook the ring of the anchor—similarly also for hooking the fish-tackle. (See Gaub-line.)

BACKS. The outermost boards of a sawn tree.

BACK-STAFF. A name formerly given to a peculiar sea-quadrant, because the back of the observer was turned towards the sun at the time of observing its zenith distance. The inventor was Captain Davis, the Welsh navigator, about 1590. It consists of a graduated arc of 30° united to a centre by two radii, with a second arc of smaller radius, but measuring 6° on the side of it. To the first arc a vane is attached for sight,—to the second one for shade,—and at the vertex the horizontal vane has a slit in it.

BACKSTAY-PLATES. Used to support the backstays.

BACKSTAYS. Long ropes extending from all mast-heads above a lower-mast to both sides of the ship or chain-wales; they are extended and set up with dead eyes and laniards to the backstay-plates. Their use is to second the shrouds in supporting the mast when strained by a weight of sail in a fresh wind. They are usually distinguished into breast and after backstays; the first being intended to sustain the mast when the ship sails upon a wind; or, in other terms, when the wind acts upon a ship obliquely from forwards; the second is to enable her to carry sail when the wind is abaft the beam; a third, or shifting backstay, is temporary, and used where great strain is demanded when chasing, chased, or carrying on a heavy pressure of canvas: they are fitted either with lashing eyes, or hook and thimble with selvagee strop, so as to be instantly removed.

BACKSTAY-STOOLS. Detached small channels, or chain-wales, fixed abaft the principal ones. They are introduced in preference to extending the length of the channels.

BACKSTERS. Flat pieces of wood or cork, strapped on the feet in order to walk over loose beach.

BACK-STRAPPED. As a ship carried round to the back of Gibraltar by a counter-current and eddies of wind, the strong currents detaining her there.

BACK-SWEEP. That which forms the hollow of the top-timber of a frame.

BACK-WATER. The swell of the sea thrown back, or rebounded by its contact with any solid body. Also the loss of power occasioned by it to paddles of steamboats, &c. The water in a mill-race which cannot get away in consequence of the swelling of the river below. Also, an artificial accumulation of water reserved for clearing channel-beds and tide-ways.

Also, a creek or arm of the sea which runs parallel to the coast, having only a narrow strip of land between it[68] and the sea, and communicating with the latter by barred entrances. The west coast of India is remarkable for its back-waters, which give a most useful smooth water communication from one place to another, such as from Cochin to Quilon, a distance of nearly 70 miles.

BACON, To save. This is an old shore-saw, adopted in nautical phraseology for expressing "to escape," but generally used in pejus ruere; as in Gray's Long Story. (See Foul Hawse.)

BAD-BERTH. A foul or rocky anchorage.

BADDERLOCK. The Fucus esculentus, a kind of eatable sea-weed on our northern shores. Also called pursill.

BADDOCK. A name from the Gaelic for the fry of the Gadus carbonarius, or coal-fish.

BADGE. Quarter badges. False quarter-galleries in imitation of frigate-built ships. Also, in naval architecture, a carved ornament placed on the outside of small ships, very near the stern, containing either a window, or the representation of one, with marine decorations.

BADGE, Seaman's. See Good-conduct Badge.

BADGER, To. To tease or confound by frivolous orders.

BADGER-BAG. The fictitious Neptune who visits the ship on her crossing the line.

BAD-NAME. This should be avoided by a ship, for once acquired for inefficiency or privateer habits, it requires time and reformation to get rid of it again. "Give a dog a bad name" most forcibly exemplified. Ships have endured it even under repeated changes of captains—one ship had her name changed, but she became worse.

BAD-RELIEF. One who turns out sluggishly to relieve the watch on deck. (See One-bell.)

BAESSY. The old orthography of the gun since called base.

BAFFLING. Is said of the wind when it frequently shifts from one point to another.

BAG. A commercial term of quantity; as, a bread or biscuit bag, a sand-bag, &c. An empty purse.—To bag on a bowline, to be leewardly, to drop from a course.

BAG, of the Head-rails. The lowest part of the head-rails, or that part which forms the sweep of the rail.

BAG, The. Allowed for the men to keep their clothes in. The ditty bag included needles and needfuls, love-tokens, jewels, &c.

BAGALA. A rude description of high-sterned vessel of various burdens, from 50 to 300 tons, employed at Muskat and on the shores of Oman: the word signifying mule among the Arabs, and therefore indicative of carrying rather than sailing.

BAG AND BAGGAGE. The whole movable property.

BAGGAGE. The necessaries, utensils, and apparel of troops.[69]

BAGGAGE-GUARD. A small proportion of any body of troops on the march, to whom the care of the whole baggage is assigned.

BAGGETY. The fish otherwise called the lump or sea-owl (Cyclopterus lumpus).

BAGGONET. The old term for bayonet, and not a vulgarism.

BAGNIO. A sort of barrack in Mediterranean sea-ports, where the galley-slaves and convicts are confined.

BAGPIPE. To bagpipe the mizen is to lay it aback, by bringing the sheet to the mizen-shrouds.

BAG-REEF. A fourth or lower reef of fore-and-aft sails, often used in the royal navy.—Bag-reef of top-sails, first reef (of five in American navy); a short reef, usually taken in to prevent a large sail from bagging when on a wind.

BAGREL. A minnow or baggie.

BAGUIO. A rare but dreadfully violent wind among the Philippine Isles.

BAHAR. A commercial weight of a quarter of a ton in the Molucca Islands.

BAIDAR. A swift open canoe of the Arctic tribes and Kurile Isles, used in pursuing otters and even whales; a slender frame from 18 to 25 feet long, covered with hides. They are impelled by six or twelve paddles. (See Kayak.)

BAIKIE. A northern name for the Larus marinus, or black-backed gull.

BAIKY. The ballium, or inclosed plot of ground in an ancient fort.

BAIL. A surety. The cargo of a captured or detained vessel is not allowed to be taken on bail before adjudication without mutual consent. It was also a northern term for a beacon or signal.

BAIL-BOND. The obligation entered into by sureties. Also when a person appears as proxy for the master of a vessel, or, on obtaining letters of marque, he makes himself personally responsible. In prize matters, however, the bail-bond is not a mere personal security given to the individual captors, but an assurance to abide by the adjudication of the court.

BAIL'D. This phrase "I'll be bail'd" is considered as an equivalent to "I'll be bound;" but it is probably an old enunciation for "I'll be poisoned," or "I'll be tormented," if what I utter is not true.

BAILO. A Levantine term for consul.

BAILS, or Bailes. The hoops which bear up the tilt of a boat.

BAIOCCO. An Italian copper coin, about equal to our halfpenny. Also a generic term for copper money or small coin.

BAIRLINN. A Gaelic term for a high rolling billow.

BAIT. The natural or artificial charge of a hook, to allure fish.

BAITLAND. An old word, formerly used to signify a port where refreshments could be procured.[70]

BALÆNA. The zoological name for the right whale.

BALANCE. One of the simple mechanical powers, used in determining the weights and masses of different bodies. Also, one of the twelve signs of the zodiac, called Libra. Balance-wheel of a chronometer—see Chronometer.