RIGGING OF THE YARDS.

Every yard must have at the yard arms—

A Head earring strop for bending the sail to.

A Jackstay

A Brace for altering the position of the yard when necessary. A lift for supporting the yard-arm.

And a Foot-rope for the men to stand upon.

At the slings or bunt

Slings-Tie-blocks or Halliards-to support or hoist it.
Trusses or a Parrel-to keep it close into the mast.

And quarter blocks-for the clewlines and the sheets of the sail set above it to reeve through.

Q.-Your fore-yard is alongside in the water, proceed to get it across the forecastle.

A.-Bring it alongside with the opposite yard-arm forward; that is, on the starboard side of the ship, place it with the port yard-arm forward; if it be on the port side, place it the contrary

way.

Reeve a tackle from the lowermast-head, overhaul it down and lash the lower block to the middle of the yard. Reeve a line through a block at the mast-head, overhaul down and bend it amidships, and stop it out to the yard arms. Sway away on the tackle and gather in the slack of the line at the same time, so as to bring the yard up over end, and cast off the stops as the yard comes over the side, and get the yard-arm across the bulwark.

Q.-Describe the present method of rigging the yard.

A.-Iron hoops with eye-bolts and thimbles in them for lifts to splice over and reef tackle blocks to shackle to, are generally fit on the yards. Short pieces of chain, with big links in one end and thimbles in the other, are used for the foot-ropes; the big links are placed over the brace-block eye-bolts, and the ropes are spliced over the thimbles. The brace pendants are often chain. The clew-garnet blocks are generally at the middle of the yard, but a better plan is to place them at the yard-arms; by doing so, and reeving the buntlines through thimbles half-way the sail, so that the lower half of them is abaft the sail, when the sail is hauled up in a gale of wind it is secure and almost furled.

Seize the leechline blocks and beckets on the jackstay. In large ships blocks are used for the topsail sheets; some ships have iron clamps and sheaves for them, and small vessels have iron sheaves in the yard-arms.

Q.-How would you rig it without iron bands?

A.-Lash the clew-garnet, reef tackle, topsail sheet, and leechline block. Rig the yard-arm thus:-First the grummet over, then the foot-rope, head-earring strop, brace pendant, and lift. Q.-Now send it aloft?

A.-Overhaul the purchase down, and hook the lower purchaseblock to the slings of the yard. Take the lifts aloft and reeve them. Then sway up, steadying the yard by the lifts as it goes up. When high enough reeve the trusses, shackle the slings, and send the purchase down. Haul taut the lifts and braces. Q.-How and where is the topmast rigging secured?

A. With dead-eyes and lanyards to the futtock shrouds, which after reeving through the top are secured alternately to the two necklaces round the lowermast.

Q. Where are the fore-topmast-stays secured?

A. They are rove through the bees of the bowsprit through the bull's-eye on the knight-heads, and set up on its end with a luff-tackle, the double-block or the stay inside the bees, and the single-block on the end.

Q.-How would you set up the fore-topmast-stay with a lanyard ?

A.-Reeve the stay through the bees, then turn a dead-eye into the end of the stay, and shackle the other dead-eye to an eye-bolt on the knight-head. Reeve the lanyard, hook the single block to the stay, close to the bee; take the fall to the capstan and set up.

Q. Where are the main-topmast-stays secured?

A.-They are rove through iron-bound clump-blocks, shackled to loops on the the foremast, and set up abaft the foremast with lanyards to bolts in the deck; or a bull's-eye hooked to an eyebolt and set up on the end.

Q.-Where is the mizzen-topmast-stay secured?

A.-A strop, with a thimble seized in it, is placed on the mainmast-head, under the eyes of the lower rigging. The stay is set up with a lanyard to the thimble, or it is rove through the thimble and secured with a racking seizing to its own part.

Q.-How do you send up a topgallant-mast?

A. The topgallant top-blocks being hooked the mast_rope reeves for the topgallant-mast as it does for the topmast. Take the end through the square hole in the fore part of the trestletrees, half-hitch it through the fid-hole, and stop it round the hound.

The mizzen-topgallant-stay is rove through a bull's-eye in the after part of the main-cap, and set up in the main-top.

Q. How do you rig a topgallant-mast?

A.-First put on the grummet, then the stay and shrouds, then the backstays.

Q.-Where does the topgallant rigging set up to?

A.-The spider band on the topmast.

The topgallant rigging is generally rove through holes in the ends of the cross-trees, and set up with a lanyard to eye-bolts in the spider hoop. In some cases it is set up in the top, and in others it is passed through a bull's eye, or thimble, and set up on its end.

Q.-How and where is the topgallant rigging secured?

A.-The two shrouds, after leading down through the horns of the topmast cross-trees and the rollers on the spider hoop on the topmast-head, are spliced or toggled together, and the double block of a purchase fitted in the bight; the lower block is secured to the eye of the lower shrouds.

This ensures both the topgallant shrouds being always taut alike; or a more general way of fitting them is, after leading through the horns of the cross-trees, they are led across and are secured on the opposite side of the top, without using a spider hoop.

Q. How is the main-topgallant-stay set up?

A.-It is rove through a block strapped around the fore-topmasthead, or through the middle sheave in the after chock of the fore-topmast cross-trees, and set up in the fore-top.

Q. Which is the larger, the topgallant back-stays or the topmast shrouds ?

A.-The topgallant back-stays.

Q.-How would you rig a jibboom?

A.-Put on the grummet, the guys, martingale, stays, footropes, and man-ropes, reeve the stays.

Q.-How would you rig out a jibboom, and what would you set up first?

A.-Hook a single purchase block on to the cap, reeve the heel-rope through the block and then through the sheave-hole in the jibboom, and make fast the end rove to the сар, heave away. Then set up the back-ropes, the jib-stays, place the foot-ropes in, and set the jib guys up.

Q.-How do the jib-stay, fore-topgallant-stay, and fore-royalstay set up?

A.-They generally reeve through holes or over sheaves in the jibboom, and they set up with a gun-tackle purchase, or with lanyards rove through thimbles or bull's-eyes, and eye-bolts. Q.-Cross a topsail yard.

A.-The yard is brought alongside precisely the same as a lower yard. Bend a yard-rope to the slings, and stop it to the

forward yard-arm; sway away until the yard is up and down; put on the lifts and reeve them as soon as it can be done; also reeve the braces. Sway away, cast off the stops, lower the upper lift and take in the lower one until the yard is square. When the yard is high enough steady it by the lifts and braces, and parral it. If it be a lower topsail yard truss it and sling it in a similar manner to the lower yard.

Q.-Cross a topgallant yard.

A. These are sent up in a similar manner to a topsail yard. Their lifts in some cases reeve through a bull's-eye seized in the rigging, and lead down and make fast to the cross-trees, but they often go with an eye-splice over the mast-head, so that the upper lift must be put on the yard-arm first, and then the yard hoisted chock up so as to get the lower lift on.

Q.-What extra rigging is there on the mainmast?

A.-A strop, with a thimble seized in for the mizzen stay to secure to, is placed under the shrouds.

Q.-What extra rigging is there on the fore-topmast?

A.-The jibstay. The two legs of the fork are rove from forward down through the fork of the topmast stays, and are lashed together abaft the mast-head under these.

It would be placed above the topmast stays and led straight to the jibboom if there were room for it between them and the underpart of the foremost cross-tree.

Q.-What extra rigging is there on a mizzen-topmast?

A.-A short pendant with a thimble spliced into the end hangs down on each side of the mast-head, for the standing part of the main-topsail-brace to reeve through, and it passes up from the mizzen-chains. They are fitted with a cut splice, and are placed on the mast-head before the burton pendants. If fitted with a necklace, the hanging blocks are used.

Q.-Why are the stays on the lower and topmast-heads placed on top of the rest of the rigging?

A.-By placing the stays on top of the rest of the rigging it takes up less room and allows the yard to brace up sharper.

NOTE.-For the same reason the mizzen-stay is sometimes taken over the foremost cross-trees.

Q.-How would you rig a topmast stunsail-boom?

A.-Put on the lower halliard-block, tack-block, boom-braces, snotter and topping lift.

Q.-How would you rig a Spanish burton ?

A.-A single Spanish burton has two single blocks, the standing part spliced into the strop of the movable block, and the bight seized or bent to the hook. This increases the power three times.

The double burton has one double and two single blocks, the standing part spliced into the strop of the single block, then rove through the double or fixed block, and the bight seized to the strop of the lower block, to which the weight to be lifted is hooked. The end is then rove up through the double block, through the lower, and, lastly, through the single block to which the standing part is secured. This purchase gives an increase of five times the power applied.

Q. How would you reeve the jib halliards?

A.-From aft forward.

Q.-How would you reeve the main-topgallant buntlines? A.-Through a hole in the top and the hole in the cross-trees, through a block at the topgallant mast-head, and down through the lizard. Overhaul them down and bend on the sails.

Q. How would you fit a main burton?

A.-Put three cringles in the leech, have two bridles with a a lizard on the lower one.

Q.-What is a Flemish horse?

A.-A foot-rope outside the foot-rope of the yard.

Q. How would you fit it?

A.-Splice the outer end into a thimble or eye-bolt at the yardarm, seize the inner end inside the foot-rope of the yard to the jackstay, and hang it abaft the yard.

Q. What is the longest rope? and what are the three strongest pieces of rigging?

A.-The fore-topgallant braces when rove double, are the longest ropes; and the fore-stays, main-stays, and lower rigging are, respectively, the strongest pieces of rigging.

Q.-Which is the upper side of a lower brace-block?

A.—The side which has the square head of the bolt in it is the uppermost, to prevent the bolt working out.

Q.-What is the difference between lower and topsail braceblocks?

A.-A lower brace-block is fitted with a double strop, topsail brace-block with two single strops. The former-to make the block lie horizontal; the latter-vertical.

Q.-Through which sheave in a lower lift-block should the hauling part reeve?

A.-Through the foremost sheave, for, if through the after one, it would, on bracing up, bind against the lee rigging and prevent it being overhauled.