PIKE. (See Half-pike. ) A long, slender, round staff, armed at the end with iron. (See Boarding-pike and Pyke. ) Formerly in general use, but which gave way to the bayonet.

Also, the peak of a hill. Also, a fish, the Esox lucius, nicknamed the fresh-water shark.

PIKE-TURN. See Chevaux de Frise.

PIL, or Pyll. A creek subject to the tide.

PILCHARD. The Clupea pilchardus, a fish allied to the herring, which appears in vast shoals off the Cornish coast about July.

PILE. A pyramid of shot or shell.—To pile arms, is to plant three fire-locks together, and unite the ramrods, to steady the outspread butt-ends of the pieces resting on the ground. A pile is also a beam of wood driven into the ground to form by a number a solid foundation for building upon. A sheeting-pile has more breadth than thickness, and is much used in constructing coffer-dams.

PILE-DRIVER. A machine adapted for driving piles. Also, applied to a ship given to pitch heavily in a sea-way.

PILGER. An east-country term for a fish-spear.

PILING ICE. In Arctic parlance, where from pressure the ice is raised, slab over slab, into a high mass, which consolidates, and is often mistaken for a berg.

PILL. (See Pil.) A term on the western coast for a draining rivulet, as well as the creek into which it falls.[528]

PILLAGE. Wanton and mostly iniquitous plunder. But an allowed ancient practice, both in this and other countries, as shown by the sea ordinances of France, and our black book of the admiralty.

PILLAN. A northern coast name for the shear-crab.

PILLAR OF THE HOLD. A main stanchion with notches for descent.

PILLAW. A dish composed at sea of junk, rice, onions, and fowls; it figured at the marriage feast of Commodore Trunnion. It is derived from the Levantine pillaf.

PILLOW. A block of timber whereon the inner end of the bowsprit is supported.

PILMER. The fine small rain so frequent on our western coasts.

PILOT. An experienced person charged with the ship's course near the coasts, into roads, rivers, &c., and through all intricate channels, in his own particular district.—Branch pilot. One who is duly authorized by the Trinity board to pilot ships of the largest draft.

PILOTAGE. The money paid to a pilot for taking a ship in or out of port, &c.

PILOT CUTTER. A very handy sharp-built sea-boat used by pilots.

PILOT-FISH. Naucrates ductor, a member of the Scomber family, the attendant on the shark.

PILOT'S-ANCHOR. A kedge used for dropping a vessel in a stream or tide-way.

PILOT'S FAIR-WAY, or Pilot's Water. A channel wherein, according to usage, a pilot must be employed.

PINCH-GUT. A miserly purser.

PINCH-GUT PAY. The short allowance money.

PINE. A genus of lofty coniferous trees, abounding in temperate climates, and valuable for its timber and resin. The masts and yards of ships are generally of pine. (See Pitch-pine.)—Pine is also a northern term for drying fish by exposure to the weather.

PING. The whistle of a shot, especially the rifle-bullets in their flight.

PINGLE. A small north-country coaster.

PINK. A ship with a very narrow stern, having a small square part above. The shape is of old date, but continued, especially by the Danes, for the advantage of the quarter-guns, by the ship's being contracted abaft. Also, one of the many names for the minnow.—To pink, to stab, as, between casks, to detect men stowed away.

PINKSTERN. A very narrow boat on the Severn.

PIN-MAUL. See Maul.

PINNACE. A small vessel propelled with oars and sails, of two, and even three masts, schooner-rigged. In size, as a ship's boat, smaller than the barge, and, like it, carvel-built. The armed pinnace of the French coasts was of 60 or 80 tons burden, carrying one long 24-pounder and 100 men. In Henry VI.

Shakspeare makes the pinnace an independent vessel, though Falstaff uses it as a small vessel attending on a larger. Also, metaphorically, an indifferent character.

PINNOLD. A term on our southern shores for a small bridge.

PINS.—Belaying pins. Short cylindrical pieces of wood or iron fixed into the fife-rail and other parts of a vessel, for making fast the running-rigging.

PINTADOS. Coloured or printed chintzes, formerly in great demand from India, and among the fine goods of a cargo.

PIN-TAIL. The Anas acuta, a species of duck with a long pointed tail. Also, in artillery, the iron pin on the axle-tree of the limber, to which the trail-eye of the gun-carriage is attached for travel.

PINTLES. The rudder is hung on to a ship by pintles and braces. The braces are secured firmly to the stern-post by jaws, which spread and are bolted on each side. The pintles are hooks which enter the braces, and the rudder is then wood-locked; a dumb pintle on the heel finally takes the strain off the hinging portions.

PIONEERS. A proportion of troops specially assigned to the clearing (from natural impediments) the way for the main body; hence, used generally in the works of an army, its scavenging, &c. Labourers of the country also are sometimes so used.

PIPE. A measure of wine containing two hogsheads, or 125 gallons, equal to half a tun. Also, a peculiar whistle for summoning the men to duty, and directing their attention by its varied sounds. (See Call.)

PIPE-CLAY. Known to the ancients under the name of paretonium; formerly indispensable to soldiers as well as the jolly marines.

PIPE DOWN! The order to dismiss the men from the deck when a duty has been performed on board ship.

PIPE-FISH. A fish of the genus Syngnathus, with an elongated slender body and long tubular mouth.

PIPER. A half-dried haddock. Also, the shell Echinus cidaris. Also, the fish Trigla lyra.

PIQUET. A proportion of a force set apart and kept on the alert for the security of the whole.—The outlying piquet, some distance from the main body, watches all hostile approach.—The inlying piquet is ready to act in case of internal disorder, or of alarm.

PIRACY. Depredation without authority, or transgression of authority given, by despoiling beyond its warrant. Fixed domain, public revenue, and a certain form of government, are exempt from that character, therefore the Barbary States were not treated by Europe as such. The Court of Admiralty is empowered to grant warrants to commit any person for piracy, only on regular information upon oath. By common law, piracy consists in committing those acts of robbery and depredation upon the high seas, which, if committed on land, would have amounted to felony, and the pirate is deemed hostis humani generis.

PIRAGUA [Sp. per agua]. See Pirogue.

PIRATE. A sea-robber, yet the word pirata has been formerly taken for a sea-captain. Also, an armed ship that roams the seas without any legal commission, and seizes or plunders every vessel she meets; their colours[530] are said to be a black field with a skull, a battle-axe, and an hour-glass. (See Prahu.)

PIRIE. An old term for a sudden gust of wind.

PIRLE. An archaic word signifying a brook or stream.

PIROGUE, or Piragua. A canoe formed from the trunk of a large tree, generally cedar or balsa wood. It was the native vessel which the Spaniards found in the Gulf of Mexico, and on the west coasts of South America; called also a dug-boat in North America.

PISCARY. A legal term for a fishery. Also, a right of fishing in the waters belonging to another person.

PISCES. The twelfth sign of the zodiac, which the sun enters about the 21st of February.

PISCIS AUSTRALIS. One of the ancient southern constellations, the lucida of which is Fomalhaut.

PISTOL. An old word for a swaggering rogue; hence Shakspeare's character in Henry V.

PISTOLA. A Papal gold coin of the sterling value of 13s. 11d.

PISTOLE. A Spanish gold coin, value 16s. 6d. sterling.

PISTOLET. This name was applied both to a small pistol and a Spanish pistole.

PISTOLIERS. A name for the heavy cavalry, temp. Jac. I.

PISTOL-PROOF. A term for the point of courage for which a man was elected captain by pirates.

PISTON. In the marine steam-engine, a metal disc fitting the bore of the cylinder, and made to slide up and down within it easily, in order, by its reciprocating movement, to communicate motion to the engine.

PISTON-ROD. A rod which is firmly fixed in the piston by a key driven through both.

PIT. In the dockyards. See Saw-pit.

PITCH. Tar and coarse resin boiled to a fluid yet tenacious consistence. It is used in a hot state with oakum in caulking the ship to fill the chinks or intervals between her planks. Also, in steam navigation, the distance between two contiguous threads of the screw-propeller, is termed the pitch. Also, in gunnery, the throw of the shot.

—To pitch, to plant or set, as tents, pavements, pitched battles, &c.

PITCH-BOAT. A vessel fitted for boiling pitch in, which should be veered astern of the one being caulked.

PITCHED. A word formerly used for stepped, as of a mast, and also for thrown.

PITCH-HOUSE. A place set apart for the boiling of pitch for the seams and bottoms of vessels.

PITCH IN, To. To set to work earnestly; to beat a person violently. (A colloquialism.)

PITCHING. The plunging of a ship's head in a sea-way; the vertical vibration which her length makes about her centre of gravity; a very straining motion.[531]

PITCH-KETTLE. That in which the pitch is heated, or in which it is carried from the pitch-pot.

PITCH-LADLE. Is used for paying decks and horizontal work.

PITCH-MOP. The implement with which the hot pitch is laid on to ships' sides and perpendicular work.

PITCH-PINE. Pinus resinosa, commonly called Norway or red pine. (See Pine.)

PITH. Well known as the medullary part of the stem of a plant; but figuratively, it is used to express strength and courage.

PIT-PAN. A flat-bottomed, trough-like canoe, used in the Spanish Main and in the West Indies.

PIT-POWDER. That made with charcoal which has been burned in pits, not in cylinders.

PIVOT. A cylinder of iron or other metal, that may turn easily in a socket. Also, in a column of troops, that flank by which the dressing and distance are regulated; in a line, that on which it wheels.

PIVOT-GUN. Mounted on a frame carriage which can be turned radially, so as to point the piece in any direction.

PIVOT-SHIP. In certain fleet evolutions, the sternmost ship remains stationary, as a pivot upon which the other vessels are to form the line anew.

PLACE. A fortress, especially its main body.

PLACE for Everything, and Everything in its Place. One of the golden maxims of propriety on board ship.

PLACE OF ARMS. In fortification, a space contrived for the convenient assembling of troops for ulterior purposes; the most usual are those at the salient and re-entering angles of the covered-way.

PLACER. A Spanish nautical term for shoal or deposit. Also, for deposits of precious minerals.

PLACES OF CALL. Merchantmen must here attend to two general rules:—If these places of call are enumerated in the charter-party, then such must be taken in the order laid down; but if leave be given to call at all, or any, then they must be taken in their geographical sequence.

PLAGES [Lat.] An old word for the divisions of the globe; as, plages of the north, the northern regions.

PLAIN. A term used in contradistinction to mountain, though far from implying a level surface, and it may be either elevated or low.

PLAN. The area or imaginary surface defined by, or within any described lines. In ship-building, the plan of elevation, commonly called the sheer-draught, is a side-plan of the ship. (See Horizontal Plan and Body-plan, or plan of projection.)

PLANE. In a general sense, a perfectly level surface; but it is a term used by shipwrights, implying the area or imaginary surface contained within any particular outlines, as the plane of elevation, or sheer-draught, &c.