When This Was
Arranged, And The Ways Greased Upon Which The Book Was To Slide,
The Falls Of The Tackles
Were stretched forward, and all hands
tallied on, and bowsed away until the book was well entered;
when these tackles
Were nippered, straps and toggles clapped
upon the falls, and two more luff tackles hooked on, with dogs,
in the same manner; and thus, by luff upon luff, the power was
multiplied, until into a pile in which one hide more could not
be crowded by hand, an hundred or an hundred and fifty were often
driven in by this complication of purchases. When the last luff
was hooked on, all hands were called to the rope - cook, steward,
and all - and ranging ourselves at the falls, one behind the other,
sitting down on the hides, with our heads just even with the beams,
we set taught upon the tackles, and striking up a song, and all
lying back at the chorus, we bowsed the tackles home, and drove
the large books chock in out of sight.
The sailor's songs for capstans and falls are of a peculiar kind,
having a chorus at the end of each line. The burden is usually
sung, by one alone, and, at the chorus, all hands join in, - and
the louder the noise, the better. With us, the chorus seemed
almost to raise the decks of the ship, and might be heard at
a great distance, ashore. A song is as necessary to sailors
as the drum and fife to a soldier.
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