Ballast. A quantity of iron, stone, or gravel, or such other like materials, deposited in a ship's hold, when she has no cargo, or too little to bring her sufficiently low in the water. It is used to counterbalance the effort of the wind upon the sails, and give the ship a proper stability, that she may be enabled to carry sail, without danger of oversetting.

Bark. A name given to vessels having three masts, with yards on the fore-andmain, and being schooner-rigged on the mizzen.

Barrel. The main piece of a capstan or steering wheel. (See CAPSTAN.)

Battens. In general, light scantlings of wood. In ship-building, long narrow laths of fir, their ends corresponding and fitted into each other with mortice and tenon, used in setting fair the sheer-lines on a ship. They are painted black in order to be the more conspicuous. Battens used on the mold-loft floor, are narrow laths, of which some are accurately graduated and marked with feet, inches, and quarters, for setting off distances. Battens for gratings are narrow thin laths of oak.

Beams. The substantial pieces of timber which stretch across the ship, from side to side, to support the decks and keep the ship together by means of the knees, etc., their ends being lodged on the clamps, keeping the ship to her breadth.

Between Perpendiculars. The length on deck from the fore part of the stem, to the after part of the stern post.

Beam Arm, or Fork Beam, is a curved piece of timber, nearly of the depth of the beam, scarphed, tabled, and bolted, for additional security to the sides of beams athwart large openings in the decks, as the main hatchway and the mast-rooms.

Breast Beams are those beams at the fore part of the quarter deck and poop, and after part of the forecastle. They are sided larger than the rest; as they have an ornamental rail in the front, formed from the solid, and a rabbet one inch broader than its depth, which must be sufficient to bury the deals of the deck, and one inch above for a spurn-water. To prevent splitting the beam in the rabbet, the nails of the deck should be crossed, or so placed, alternately, as to form a sort of zigzag line. Half-beams are short beams introduced to support the deck where there is no framing, as in those places where the beams are kept asunder by hatchways, ladder-ways, etc. They are let down on the clamp at the side, and near midships, into fore and aft carlings. On some decks they are abaft the mizzen

mast, generally of fir, let into the side tier of carlings.

The Midship Beam is the longest beam of the ship, lodged in the midshipframe, or between the widest frame of timbers.

Bearding. The diminishing of the edge or surface of a piece of timber, etc., from a given line, as on the dead-wood, clamps, plank-sheers, fife-rails, etc. Bearding-line. A curved line occasioned by bearding the dead-wood to the

form of the body; the former being sided sufficiently, this line is carried high enough to prevent the heels of timbers from running to a sharp edge, and forms a rabbet for the timbers to step on; hence, it is often called the STEPPING

LINE.

Bed. A solid framing of timber to receive and to support the mortar in a Bomb Vessel.

Beetle. A large mallet used by caulkers for driving in their reeming irons to open the seams, in order for caulking.

Belly. The inside or hollow part of compass or curved timber, the outside of which is called the BACK.

Bell-top. A term applied to the top of a quarter galley when the upper stool is hollowed away, or made like a rim, to give more height, as in the quarter galleries of small vessels, and the stool of the upper finishing comes home to the side, to complete overhead.

Bend-mould, in whole moulding. A mould made to form the futtocks in the square body, assisted by the rising-square, and floor-hollow.

Bends. The frames or ribs that form the ship's body from the keel to the top of the side at any particular station. They are first put together on the ground. That at the broadest part of the ship is denominated the MIDSHIPThe fore-parts of the wales are commonly called Bends. Between-decks. The space contained between any two decks of a ship.

BEND or DEAD-FLAT.

FORE BODY OF A WOODEN VESSEL.

Bevel. A well-known instrument, composed of a stock and a movable tongue, for taking of angles on wood, etc., by shipwrights called BEVELINGS. Beveling-board. A piece of deal on which the bevelings or angles of the timbers, etc., are described.

Bevelings. The windings or angles of the timbers, etc., a term applied to any deviation from a square or right-angle. Of beveling there are two sorts, denominated Standing Bevelings and Under Bevelings. By the former is meant an obtuse angle, or that which is without a square; and, by the latter, is understood an acute angle, or that which is within a square.

Bilge. That part of a ship's floor, on either side of the keel, which has more of an horizontal than of a perpendicular direction, and on which the ship would rest if laid on the ground; or, more particularly, those projecting parts of the bottom which are opposite to the heads of the floor-timbers amidships, on each side of the keel.

The pieces of timkeep them upright

Bilge Trees, or Bilge Pieces, or Bilge Keels. ber fastened under the bilge of boats, or other vessels, to when on shore, or to prevent their falling to leeward when sailing. Bilgeways. A square bed of timber, placed under the bilge of the ship, to support her while launching.

Bindings. The iron links which surround the dead-eyes.

Binding-strakes. Two strakes of oak plank, worked all the way fore-andaft upon the beams of each deck, within one strake of the coamings of the main hatchway, in order to strengthen the deck, as that strake and the midship strakes are cut off by the pumps, etc.

Bins.

A sort of large chests, or erections in store-rooms, in which the stores are deposited. They are generally 3 or 4 feet deep, and nearly of the same breadth.

To Birth-up. A term generally used for working up a topside or bulk-head with board or thin plank.

Black-strake. A broad strake, which is parallel to, and worked upon the

upper edge of, the wales, in order to strengthen the ship. It derives its name from being paid with pitch, and is the boundary for the painting of the topsides. Ships having no ports near the wales, have generally two blackstrakes.

Blocks, for Building the Ship Upon, are those solid pieces of oak timber fixed under the ship's keel, upon the groundways.

Board. Timber sawed to a less thickness than plank; all broad stuff of, or under, one inch and a half in thickness.

Bodies. The figure of a ship, abstractedly considered, is supposed to be divided into different parts, or figures, to each of which is given the appellation of Body. Hence, we have the terms FORE BODY, AFTER BODY, CANT BODIES, and SQUARE BODY. Thus, the Fore Body is the figure, or imaginary