SAILING CRAFT 109 



heigh o ail Eh heigh eel Eh hugh! 

 In comes the brace till the trim suits the mate, 

 when he calls out ' Turn the cross jack brace 1 ' 

 which means making it fast on a belaying pin. 

 The other braces follow. By the time the top- 

 gallant braces are reached only two hands are 

 needed, as the higher yards are naturally much 

 lighter than the lower ones. 



Sheets and braces are very dangerous things 

 to handle in a gale of wind. Every movement 

 of the rope must be closely watched with one 

 vigilant eye, while the other must be looking 

 out for washing seas. The slightest inatten- 

 tion to the belaying of a mainsheet while men 

 are hanging on may mean that it breaks loose 

 just as the men expect it to be fast, when away 

 it goes, with awful suddenness and force, 

 dragging them clean overboard before their 

 instinctive grip can be let go. The slightest 

 inattention to the seas may mean an equally 

 fatal result. Not once, nor twice, but several 

 times, a whole watch has been washed away 

 from the fore-braces by some gigantic wave, 

 and every single man in it been drowned. 



Squalls need smart handling. Black squalls 

 are nothing, even when the ship lays over till 

 the lee rail 's under a sluicing rush of broken 

 water. But a really wicked white squall 



