300 



Mv. E. W. Gn.luer 0,1 the 



starteil to reach it. '' Sailing vessels may ... be seen stuek 

 fast in s[)ite ot" a breeze brisk enough to kee[) the sails fully 



strained Sometimes it happened that one vessel 



gets into dead-water and another not, though it is impossible 



to discover any reason for this." " we already had 



good speed, when all at once the ship took dead-water .... 

 she stopped so quickly that it looked as if she had dropped 

 anchor." The vessels being becalmed, " One of them was 

 towed away without any difficulty, while the other, tiiough 

 of similar size, got into dead-water, and an extraordinary 

 amount of work was required to get this vessel from the 

 spot." Another ship in dead-water drifted back four miles 

 with the current " against the direction of the steady fresli 

 breeze, although they had all sails set." Another observer 

 writes that in dead-water it " . . . . feels as if something 

 were fastened to the ship and holding it back." '' In such 

 cases, one oi* more vessels might suddenly lose their steering 

 and remain on the spot, while others pass freely through the 

 midst of them at a distance as short as two or three ships' 

 length. After a while it was the turn of the other vessels 

 to get into dead-water.'' " We scarcely glided along and 

 were forced to have all sails set^ until we were quite near 

 our anchorage. Then the dead-water suddenly let go its 

 hold. Believe me, they were both in a hurry, the ship and 

 the pilot. Braces and falls ran a race together, and we only 

 just got the anchor dropped without any misfortune." "The 



brig got into dead-water The speed was lost, and the 



ship was as if nailed to the spot." When the dead-water 

 let go with the sails drawing, " .... it all at once appeared 

 as if the vessel had cut loose from a mooring aft." An 

 8-knot steamer in dead-water " . . . . according to tlie pilot's 

 own phrase, hardly moved from the spot." 



Other descriptions might be quoted, but, save the one 

 now to follow, these are the most typical. '^I'he one now to 

 to be given^ with a sketch showing the appearance of the 

 water around the vessel, is from the pen of Koramandor- 

 kaptein Joh. Kroepelieu of the Norwegian Navy. He 

 writes that the ship with all sails set, heeling over rather 



stiffly before a fresh breeze " all of a sudden, lost her 



headway without any perceptible external cause, and the 

 turning power of the rudder became nil. 



" We then perceived that the ship had taken dead-water. 

 From about amidships and outwards on both sides and to a 

 considerable distance aft she was surrounded by a mass of 

 dead-water, smooth as glass, as if the surface were covered 

 with oil. The line between this smooth surface and the 



