SERVICE, UNITED STATES LIFE-SAVING. 



7G3 



hauling line. This is an endless rope or ellipse, 

 an inch and a half in circumference, and Ion" 

 enough to reach from the shore to the vessel 

 It is reeved through a pulley-block, having at- 

 tached to it several feet of rope called a tail 



on board by means of the shot-line. With it 



bridge of rope constituted by the hawser. 



If there are a large number of persons to bo 

 saved, the life-car is used. This is a covered 



printed, in French upon one side and in Eng- 

 ish upon the other directions for properly set- 

 ting up the whip-lme on the vessel. When 



this is done a signal is made to the shore, and also attached the hauling in s, all the e ropes 

 a hawser of sufficient length and four inches 



from the insidefXh ^1^ whUe thd? 



raised edges exclude wate It is suspended 

 on the hawser by bails rad rings o whK 

 " 



in circumference, to which is attached another 

 tally-board, bearing printed directions in Eng- 

 lish and French for its disposition, is tied to 

 one part of the whip or hauling line, and is 

 sent out to the vessel by the life-saving crew 

 pulling upon the other part. Obeying the di- 

 rections of this tally-board, the men on the 

 ship fasten the hawser to the mast about eigh- 

 teen inches above the hauling-line. A crotch, 

 made of two pieces of wood, three by two inch- 

 es thick and ten feet long, crossed near the top, 

 so as to form a sort of X, and bolted together,' 

 is erected, and the shore end of the hawser is 

 drawn over the intersection. A sand-anchor, 

 composed of two pieces of hard wood six feet 

 long; eight inches wide, and two inches thick, 

 crossed at their centers, bolted together, and 



, 



being arranged to it before the hawseHs fast 

 ened^ behind the crotch It is eddent that" 



' 



CROTCH, HAWSER, AND SAND-ANCHOR. 



furnished at the center with a stout iron ring, 

 is laid obliquely in a trench dug behind the 

 crotch. An iron hook, from which runs a strap 

 of rope, having at its other end an iron ring 

 called a bull's-eye, is now fastened into the 

 ring of the sand-anchor. This strap connects 

 by the bull's-eye with a double pulley-block at 

 the end of the hawser behind the crotch, by 

 which the hawser is drawn and kept taut. 

 The trench is solidly filled in, and the imbedded 



by pu]]ing on one part rf fte hanling . line) the 



life-saving crew can send out the suspended 

 life-car to th'e vessel above the surface of the 

 sea, and, when it has received its load, draw 

 it back to the shore by pulling on the other 

 part. Its use has been uniformly successful, 

 201 persons having been saved by it from the 

 immigrant ship Ayrshire at its first trial, in a 

 sea which made boat service impossible and 

 which utterly destroyed the vessel. Another 

 mode of using the life-car is the following : By 

 means of the shot-line, a single hauling-line, 

 something more than the length of the dis- 

 tance of the wreck from the shore, is drawn 

 on board, the end of it being made fast to a 

 ring at one extremity of the life-car. To a 

 ring at the other extremity a similar hauling- 

 line is attached, the end of which remains on 

 shore. By the first hauling-line the car is 

 dragged out through the water, as a boat, by 

 those on board, and, having received its load, 

 is dragged back again through the water by 

 the line handled by the men on land. This 

 method of working the life-car is resorted to 

 under certain exigencies, but is less desirable 

 than the other, because, although the people it 

 contains are safe, the car is liable to be turned 

 over and over in its passage through the break- 

 ers, much to their discomfort. 



The large majority of the vessels now strand- 

 ed upon our coasts being coasters (schooners 

 and barks), with crews of from six to ten men, 

 the breeches-buoy is more commonly used. 

 This is a much lighter contrivance, and there- 

 fore easier to transport and handle, weighing 



