References
The author's life is fully and sympathetically treated in
Charles Francis Adams's Richard Henry Dana. Boston, 1890.
The most exhaustive history of California and the Pacific coast in
general is H. H. Bancroft's History of the Pacific States of North
America. San Francisco, 1882-1888. A briefer work is Josiah Royce's
California. Boston, 1886. Though this book considers mainly the
transition period, 1846-1856, its introduction gives an excellent
survey of earlier years. F. J. Turner's Rise of the New West,
which is volume XIV of the American Nation, New York, 1907, tells the
story of the development of the whole territory west of the Mississippi.
Those who are curious to search out all the items of ship construction
will find them adequately illustrated, under the caption, "ship," in
both Standard and Century dictionaries.
Explanation of Diagram
The following diagram, from which many details have been omitted,
presents sufficient data for an understanding of the more important
nautical terms which occur in the text. A number of other such terms
have been explained in the notes. In omitting reference to many more,
the editor has felt that ovarannotation would turn a straightforward
and interesting narrative into a mere excuse for a nautical dictionary,
and quite defeat the purpose of the book. The author's technical
vocabulary, even when most bewildering, serves to give force and the
vividness of local color to his descriptions. To pause in the midst
of a storm at sea for comment and definition would result merely in
checking the movement of the story and putting a damper upon the
imagination.
Two Years before the Mast affords the teacher a somewhat unusual
opportunity. Few literary works are better calculated to stimulate
inquiry into the remarkable changes which three-quarters of a century
have wrought in the United States. Much profitable class employment
in the drawing of maps and the writing of brief themes dealing with
various phases of the romantic history of California will suggest
itself. The numerous geographical allusions should be traced with
the aid of an atlas.
| - + -
- + - | |j|
/| | - + -
/ |f| | |i|
/ + - - -+ - -
/ /|e| | | |
/ / + - - | | h|
/ / | | - - + - -
/a / |d | | | |
/__/ b + - - | | g |
/ /_____|c | \__|____\
/__/ |___| |
\ - - - + - - - - - + - - - -
\_______________________/
a. Flying jib.
b. Jib.
c. Foresail.
d. Foretopsail.
e. Foretopgallantsail.
f. Foreroyal.
g. Mainsail.
h. Maintopsail.
i. Maintopgallantsail.
j. Mainroyal.
|
|B2
| | |C2
|A2 6 - + - |
3 - + - | 9 - + -
| || |
|| | ||
| 5 - + - |
2 - -+ - - |B1 |C1
E - __ |A1 || 8 - -+ - -
- __ || | |
- | 4 - - + - - ||
1 - - + - - | 7 - - + - - G __ -
| | | __ - /
|A |B |C F __ - \ /
D | | | __ - H\/
- - - ______|________|________|________ - - - - -
\_______________________________/
A. Mizzenmast.
A1. Mizzentopmast.
A2. Mizzentopgallant and royalmast.
B. Mainmast.
B1. Maintopmast.
B2. Maintopgallant and royalmast.
C. Foremast.
C1. Foretopmast.
C2. Foretopgallant and royalmast.
D. Spanker boom.
E. Spanker gaff.
F. Bowsprit.
G. Jib boom and flying jib boom.
H. Martingale boom.
1. Crossjack yard.
2. Mizzentopsail yard.
3. Mizzentopgallant yard.
4. Main yard.
5. Maintopsail yard.
6. Maintopgallant yard.
7. Fore yard.
8. Foretopsail yard.
9. Foretopgallant yard.
[Editor: Many more numbered lifts, stays, and braces were left out
of these simplified diagrams. They are intended to be viewed using
a fixed-width font.]
Each mast section is joined to the lower one in two places:
| |
| |
___|_|_
\_____/ Mast cap.
| | |
| | |
| | |
_|_|_|_
\_____/ Trestletree.
| |
| |
Each mast also sports net-like rigging from the lowest
trestletree to the deck. These are called "shrouds".
TWO YEARS BEFORE THE MAST
PREFACE
I am unwilling to present this narrative to the public without a
few words in explanation of my reasons for publishing it. Since
Mr. Cooper's Pilot and Red Rover, there have been so many stories
of sea-life written, that I should really think it unjustifiable
in me to add one to the number without being able to give reasons
in some measure warranting me in so doing.
With the single exception, as I am quite confident, of Mr. Ames's
entertaining, but hasty and desultory work, called "Mariner's Sketches,"
all the books professing to give life at sea have been written by persons
who have gained their experience as naval officers, or passengers,
and of these, there are very few which are intended to be taken as
narratives of facts.
Now, in the first place, the whole course of life, and daily duties,
the discipline, habits and customs of a man-of-war are very different
from those of the merchant service; and in the next place, however
entertaining and well written these books may be, and however accurately
they may give sea-life as it appears to their authors, it must still be
plain to every one that a naval officer, who goes to sea as a gentleman,
"with his gloves on," (as the phrase is,) and who associated only with
his fellow-officers, and hardly speaks to a sailor except through a
boatswain's mate, must take a very different view of the whole matter
from that which would be taken by a common sailor.
Besides the interest which every one must feel in exhibitions of
life in those forms in which he himself has never experienced it;
there has been, of late years, a great deal of attention directed
toward common seamen, and a strong sympathy awakened in their behalf.
Yet I believe that, with the single exception which I have mentioned,
there has not been a book written, professing to give their life and
experiences, by one who has been of them, and can know what their
life really is. A voice from the forecastle has hardly yet been
heard.
In the following pages I design to give an accurate and authentic
narrative of a little more than two years spent as a common sailor,
before the mast, in the American merchant service. It is written
out from a journal which I kept at the time, and from notes which
I made of most of the events as they happened; and in it I have
adhered closely to fact in every particular, and endeavored to give
each thing its true character.
