Main and foresail rig. This term is employed for want of a better. Its meaning will be obvious; a boat is rigged with a large main sail and foresail, or possibly with a jib. The rig is frequently applied to the racing boats known as half-raters.

The

Main and mizzen rig.-This is a rig frequently seen in small boats, on account of its general handiness for all seasons, and it is peculiarly adapted to very long boats. rig consists of a mainsail, which may be a balance lug and a mizzen, with or without the addition of a foresail. Mr. Christopher Davies in his "Boat Sailing for Amateurs” makes various remarks upon the utility of this rig and of a variety of it in which the mizzen works with the tiller, much in the same way as the jigger of a barge.

MAIN AND FORESAIL.

MAIN AND MIZZEN.

Main deck.-The principal deck on a vessel having several decks. (See DECK.)

Main yard men (old term).-Men on the sick list.

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Make.-An expression signifying "to reach" or attain to." Thus, to make a harbour is to reach it; to try and make any object, to try and reach it.

Make headway.-To move forward, generally expressed as against some difficulty, as against a head-wind or tide.

Make water.-To leak.

Making of the tides.—The tides are highest and lowest about new and full moon, when they are called spring tides, and smallest at the intermediate times (first and last quarters of the moon), when they are known as neap tides. From the period of neap to that of spring tide, therefore, the tides must be increasing in strength and volume, and are then said to be making. (See LAGGING OF THE TIDES.)

Mal-de-mer.—A malady which often overtakes those unused to the motion of the sea.

Man.-To place the right complement of hands upon a ship or any part of it.

To man a boat.-To place in her her full number of rowers.

To man the yards.—To range the people on the yards, rigging, etc., of a vessel, either in honour of some person or in commemoration of some event, as a salute.

Man-hole.-A hole in an engine's boiler, or elsewhere, through which a man can crawl when necessary to examine the inside.

Man-ropes.-A general name for ropes used in ascending a ship's sides, hatchways, etc.

Manly. A term sometimes used by the fishermen to describe the seaworthiness of a vessel. If she is handy and a good weather boat she is said to behave herself "like a man,' "" or in "manly" fashion. Manilla.—“ A valuable cordage made in the Philippines, which not being subject to rot does not require to be tarred."* (Smyth.) Mariner.-Anciently, a first-class, or able-bodied seaman. Mariner's compass. (See COMPASS.)

Marines.—A corps of men serving something like soldiers on board a vessel of war. They are sometimes called the "jollies," in contradistinction to the name "johnnies," given to the bluejackets. Marks-Marks and dips, or deeps.-Certain divisions on the hand lead-line to show depth at a glance or by feeling. (See LEAD.)

Mar-line.-Small line, composed of two strands very little twisted. It may be either white or tarred. Mar-line is commonly used in parcelling a rope-that is binding canvas round it, to prevent its galling. It is also the material employed in securing the bolt ropes to large sails by a peculiar system of knots called marling hitches, instead of sewing.

Marling. To marl.-To wind any small line, as mar-line, spun line, etc., round a rope in such a manner that every turn it takes is secured by a sort of knot. It is thus much safer than mere whipping, for if one lap wears through the others still hold. The art of marling must be learned from some fisherman or waterman. Marling spike.—A pointed instrument of iron used to open the strands of rope when splicing, marling, etc.

Maroon." To put one or more sailors on shore upon a desolate island, under pretence of their having committed some great crime. This detestable expedient has been too often practised by some inhuman commanders of merchant ships, particularly in the West Indies." (Falconer.)

Marry.-To join ropes together, as it were in the bond of matrimony. Thus-1. (In splicing rope.) To join one rope to another in such a manner that the join may be reeved through a block. 2. (In working ships.) To marry ropes, braces, or falls. -To hold two such ropes together, and, by pressure, to haul in on both equally.

Marryat's code. The code of signalling for many years used at sea, but now superseded by the International Code. (See SIGNALS.) Martello towers.-The name given to the small circular forts, or towers, met with along the East and South-East coasts, and placed there in view of the meditated and

boasted invasion of England by Bonaparte. "The name is usually supposed to be derived from a fort in Mortella (Myrtle) Bay, Corsica, which, after a determined resistance, was at last captured by the British in 1794."

MARTELLO TOWER.

Martingale The rope extending from a jib boom end downwards to a dolphin striker; its office being to stay the jib boom in the same manner as the bobstays stay the bowsprit. (See diagram under DOLPHIN STRIKER.)

Martnets. In square rig, small lines fastened to the leech of a sail reeved through a block on the mast head and brought down on deck, their use being to bring the leech of a sail to its yard to be furled. This is called topping up on the martnets.

Mast.-"A long piece, or system of pieces, of timber, placed nearly perpendicularly to the keelson of a vessel to support the yards, or gaffs, on which the sails are extended. When a mast is one entire piece, it is called a pole-mast; but in all large vessels it is composed of several lengths, called lower, top, and top-gallant mastssometimes a fourth, called a royal mast, which, however, is usually in one piece with the top-gallant mast." (Brande and Cox.) Under this heading it may be most generally useful to describe the gear employed to support the mast and top-mast of a cutter or yawl yacht, referring the reader to the figures (opposite), and where technical terms are made use of, to the definitions under their respective headings. A mast is said, when set up, to be stepped, because its foot is fitted into a step, or chock, the office of which is to distribute the weight of the mast over as great a part of the keelson as may be possible. It is held upright to the level of the deck by a framework called the mast-case; and is further strengthened, on the deck itself, by a frame called the partners. The lower portion of the mast is usually square, this part being called the housing, because it is housed, or enclosed in the mast case. The mast is not, however, fitted very closely in its framing, but, on the contrary, is allowed a little play in these parts, in case they, or the deck, should swell or become strained, and press upon it, a possibility which might be attended by serious consequences; it depends, in fact, for its support upon its shrouds and stays. In such craft as certain barges, or the Norfolk wherries, not only is the stowage room usually occupied by the mast housing required for cargo, but beyond this there is the constant necessity to lower the mast in passing under bridges. The mast is, therefore, set up on deck, its housing working in a casing called the tabernacle. The mast being stepped, is now to be rigged. At a short distance from the mast head are the hounds, otherwise called the cheeks, on which the shrouds rest (supporting the mast laterally), together with the back-stays, which prevent it from falling forward, and the fore-stay, which keeps it from falling backward all of these serving to hold it securely up. That part of the mast from the deck upwards to the hounds is called the hounding: the part above this is the head. The shrouds communicate with the shroud plates, often called the channels, on the vessel's sides, by means of lanyards, rove through the dead eyes, which enable them to be made taut. The back stays with their tackles run further aft; while the fore-stay runs down to the stem-head. Just above the hounds, and supported by them, are the trestle-trees, which, in

their turn, are short pieces of wood running fore and aft and bearing the cross trees. The cross trees give lateral support to the topmast. At the mast head projects an iron ring, called the cap: through it the topmast runs; and between the trestle trees is usually another

ring, called the lower cap, or yoke, answering a like purpose. The topmast is placed forward of the lower mast, and thus runs up between the trestle trees and in the caps. When raised so that its heel is just above the level of the cross tree, a bolt of iron, the fid,

is passed through a hole at its heel called the fid-hole: the fid rests upon the trestle-trees, and on it the whole weight of the topmast is carried. The topmast is then said to be fidded. The topmast fidded, requires staying. A short distance below the truck are small cheeks, placed there, as on the lower mast, for the reception of the topmast shrouds and stays. The shrouds are stretched over the extremities of the cross-trees and brought down only a little below them, their ends being usually attached to ropes, called legs, which, by means of a purchase, serve to haul them taut. The reason why these shrouds are not brought down to the deck when the topmast is set (as are the main shrouds) is this:-if they came down to the deck when the topmast was up, they would be so long when it came down that it would be difficult to coil them out of the way; whereas, by keeping them short they only just reach the deck when the topmast is struck, and (the legs being detached) they can be comfortably stowed away. The topmast forestay prevents the topmast from falling backward; it runs down from the mast head to the bowsprit head. The topmast backstays keep it back and belay, therefore, some distance aft of the mast; they can be slackened out as the sail swings over. Upon the lower mast, between the trestle-trees and the cap, are hung the various blocks through which pass the halyards; and, on the topmast, those for the topsail and jib topsail halyards. Such is the mast of a large yacht; but many boats are without a topmast, as are the mizzen masts of yawls, and generally of ketches, these being, in fact, nothing more than poles; and hence they are called, as above mentioned, pole-masts.

Masts are variously named, according to the rig of the vessel :-In a full-rigged ship the masts are three in number, viz., the main, the fore, and the mizzen, the main being in the centre and the mizzen aft; and as the ship appears to be the standard by which other vessels are compared, it would seem to follow that all vessels are, more or less, but modifications of it. Thus in four-masted ships there is one mast added, viz., the jigger (see below), and they carry, therefore, fore, main, mizzen, and jigger masts; while one large German sailing vessel has five. The bark and the barkentine, like the ship, carry the three masts, the difference between these and the ship being in the modification of the rigs. In schooners, brigs, and brigantines, the mizzen has been cut off, leaving the two masts fore and main. The main is, in these, therefore, the after one. In ketches, yawls, and some barges, there are also two masts, but the fore has been cut off, leaving the main and mizzen, and here, therefore, the main becomes the forward mast. In cutters, sloops, and in many fishing craft, both fore and mizzen have been cut off, leaving only one mast, the main. Luggers have sometimes three masts and sometimes two, in the latter case, generally, the main and mizzen.

There are also masts which constitute no general part of a vessel's rig; as jury masts, which are temporary masts, set up before the permanent masts are stepped, to take the vessel only a short distance, or in place of one accidentally carried away. Barges are