The methods of handling anchors and chains, herein described, are common to sailing vessels fitted with hand capstans. Vessels of war of recent construction, are fitted with steam capstans and windlasses: but as the same general practice obtains in all, a description of each is deemed unnecessary.

Anchors. Although the general form of the anchor has undergone but slight modification since the earliest ages, yet there are, even at this late day, as many opinions as authorities in regard to the best proportions and best shape of the various parts.

Anchors are made of wrought iron and cast steel. Great care is exercised in the quality of the steel used, and the casting is very carefully annealed to give it the proper uniformity and toughness. Both kinds for the navy are made at the Navy Yard, Boston, Mass.

Anchors are of two kinds-Solid, or ordinary, and Port

able.

The Solid or ordinary anchors are those which have the shank and arms wrought into one body, or mass, at the crown of the anchor, Fig. 414, Plate 87.

The Portable anchors are those which admit of being separated, and taken to pieces. Of this kind there are many varieties.

Figs. 414 and 415 show the wooden-stocked and ironstocked anchor as commonly supplied to the service, the former being at present reserved for permanent moorings, iron-stocked anchors being furnished exclusively on board ship.

In Fig. 414:

The shank is all that part extending in a straight line from a to b.

The square is that part of the shank which extends from c to d, to which the stock is attached.

The arm is the part which extends from the throat (or crutch) to the extreme end, from e to ƒ, including the palm, the point and the blade.

The palm or fluke is the part of the arm, of a shield-like form, from g to h, and constitutes the holding surface of the anchor.

The point (pee or bill) is the part of the arm included between the termination of the palm and the extreme end, from f to h.

The blade is the part of the arm at the back of the palm from i to k.

The crown is the external arch upon which the anchor falls when let go in a vertical position, and may be said to extend from k to k'.

The ring (or jews-harp), o, is the appendage by which the cable is attached to the anchor, by means of a shackle on the end of the cable, called the anchor-shackle. The last link of the chain, which is secured into this shackle by a pin, is of peculiar form, and is called the club-link.

The stock, p, is the transverse beam which cants the anchor when the arms fall in a horizontal instead of a vertical position.

The throat of the arms is the curved part at e, where the arms are joined to the shank.

All anchors and chains used in the navy are made at the foundry in the navy-yard at Boston.

Iron Stocks. An iron stock is generally a round bar of iron with a collar near the centre. It is put through a hole in the square of the shank, the collar resting against one side, and being kept there by a forelock which passes through the stock on the other side of the square. There is a washer between the forelock and the square.

A Wooden Stock has generally a square section tapering both ways towards the centre; it is encircled with iron hoops, and a square hole is cut in the centre to fit it on the square of the shank. An improved plan is to make it of two pieces, by cutting it lengthwise, and to forge projections from the square to be enclosed between the two parts of the stock and furnish large bearings; the two halves after being put on are hooped together.

Wooden stocks are made of oak, in two pieces left sufficiently apart in the middle to give greater binding power to the hoops, and to admit of their being driven up when the wood shrinks, a precaution which should be adopted after long exposure to a hot sun.

The following is taken from the Book of Allowances of

1881:

1. All anchors and kedges are to have iron stocks. The weight of an iron stock is, as nearly as possible, one-fourth of the anchor to which it belongs.

2. Bower and sheet anchors are to be alike in weight. The weight of an anchor or kedge, as marked on it, being inclusive of the bending-shackle and stock.

3. Stream-anchors, in all cases, when allowed, are to be about one-fourth the weight of the bower.

4. Kedges, when four are allowed, are to be, respectively, about one-seventh, one-eighth, one-tenth, and one-fourteenth the weight of the bower; when three are allowed, one-sixth, one-eighth, and one-tenth; when two are allowed, one-sixth and one-tenth; and when one is allowed, oneeighth.

5. Each boat of every vessel is allowed one anchor; the weight in pounds to be obtained by multiplying the square of the extreme breadth by 1.2.

Proof of Anchors. Each forging or casting is slung in chains and raised to a height of 15 feet from the ground to the lowest part of the forging as it hangs in the slings. It is then dropped on ground of the hardness of a good macadamized road. It is then lifted from the ground, and hanging in the slings is well hammered over its parts with a sledge hammer, weighing not less than seven pounds, and it must give under this treatment such a clear ring in all its parts as shall satisfy the inspector that the forging is sound and without flaws existing either originally or developed as the result of these tests.

Many anchors are now fitted with a balancing band around the shank at the centre of gravity of the entire mass. A heavy link or shackle is secured to this band and by hooking the cat block, or pendant, into it the anchor is lifted to the bill board, or the frame on which it is carried, without using the fish.

Portable Anchors. The two arms of a portable anchor, called flukes, are in most of them attached to the shank by means of a pin through the centre of the flukes, and through jaws forged on the end of the shank. The flukes may either be kept firm by forging lugs on them to embrace a shoulder on the shank, or they may move around the pin. In this case the extent of the motion may be limited by a second pin through the shoulder, playing in a long hole in the flukes, or simply by the bills coming in contact with the shank. When the flukes are movable they have to be so shaped that when the upper arm is drawn as near the shank as possible, the other fulfils the proper conditions for holding. To force the arms to assume this position, it is necessary to provide each of them with a horn projecting outward just above the palm. This forms a secondary bill, which holds quick, and brings the arm in a position to hold also. The two arms may be forged separately, with a tenon at the end of each, by means of which they are fastened to the shank, on which mortises are cut to receive the tenons. Porter's anchor, as improved by Trotman, and known now by the latter name, is of this description; see Fig. 416.