Able seaman

“ To put a marlinspike in a man's hand and set him to work upon a piece of rigging, is considered a fair trial of his qualities as an able seaman.
There is, of course, a great deal of difference in the skill and neatness of the work of different men; but I believe I am safe in saying that no man will pass for an able seaman in a square-rigged vessel, who cannot make a long and short splice in a large rope, fit a block-strap, pass seizings to lower rigging, and make the ordinary knots, in a fair, workmanlike manner. ”

“ The letters A.B., which mean Able Seaman, are placed against the names of those only who are thorough-bred sailors, or who, in sea phrase, can not only "hand, reef, and steer," but are likewise capable of heaving the lead in the darkest night, as well as in the day-time; who can use the palm and needle of a sail-maker; and who are versed in every part of a ship's rigging, in the stowage of the hold, and in the exercise of the great guns. Of course, an A.B. must be able to pull an oar, as well as use it in sculling, understand the management of a boat under sail, and know how to cross a surf. ”

“ The common saying that to hand, reef and steer makes a sailor, is a mistake. It is true that no man is a sailor until he can do these things; yet to ship for an able seaman he must, in addition to these, be a good workman upon rigging. ”

“ If the sail-maker ships also for seaman, he must do an able seaman’s duty, if called upon; and if he does not so ship, he will still be required to assist in all-hands work, according to his ability; and in bad weather, or in case of necessity, he may be put with a watch, and required to do ship’s duty with the rest. ”

“ SEAMAN. This is a term seldom bestowed among seafaring men upon their associates, unless they are known to be pre-eminent in every duty of the thorough-paced tar; one who never issues a command which he is not competent to execute himself, and is deemed an authority on every matter relating to sea-craft.—The able seaman is the seafaring man who knows all the duties of common seamanship, as to rig, steer, reef, furl, take the lead, and implicitly carry out the orders given, in a seamanlike manner. ”

“ Thus, in the forecastle, with the watch below, an able seaman, lying in his bunk, will order an ordinary seaman to fetch him his shoes or bring him a drink of water. Now the ordinary seaman may be lying in his bunk. He is just as tired as the able seaman. Yet he must get out of his bunk and fetch and carry. If he refuses, he will be beaten. If, perchance, he is so strong that he can whip the able seaman, then all the able seamen, or as many as may be necessary, pitch upon the luckless devil and administer the beating. ”

“ Cabin-boy at twelve, ship’s boy at fourteen, ordinary seamen at sixteen, able seaman at seventeen, and cock of the fo’c’sle, infinite ambition and infinite loneliness, receiving neither help nor sympathy, I did it all for myself—navigation, mathematics, science, literature, and what not. ”

“ And what the crew itself would be like God alone could tell—so said the mate. Shorty, the Japanese (or Malay) and Italian half-caste, the mate told me, was an able seaman, though he had come out of steam and this was his first sailing voyage.
“Ordinary seamen!” Mr. Pike snorted, in reply to a question. “We don’t carry Landsmen!—forget it! Every clodhopper an’ cow-walloper these days is an able seaman. That’s the way they rank and are paid. The merchant service is all shot to hell. There ain’t no more sailors. They all died years ago, before you were born even.” ”

“ This working upon rigging is the last thing to which a lad training up to the sea is put, and always supposes a competent acquaintance with all those kinds of work that are required of an ordinary seaman or boy. A seaman is generally expected to be able to sew upon a sail, and few men ship for seamen who cannot do it; yet, if he is competent in other respects, no fault can be found with an able seaman for want of skill in sailmaking.
In allotting the jobs among the crew, reference is always had to a man's rate and capacity ”

“ I was once on a large American ship where for a whole night we were standing off the Delaware Capes in an easterly gale, and were forced to use deep-sea lead. At considerable peril and much loss of rest for the crew, the ship was rounded to the wind in the face of a dangerous sea, so as to check her speed. Twice during that night we had to haul up the mainsail and lay the mainyard back. At such a time every man is expected to know his duty. Should the night be as dark as pitch, an able seaman must take the lead, weighing twenty-eight pounds, on the forecastle head. ”

“ An ordinary seaman need not be a complete helmsman, and if an able seaman should be put in his place at the wheel in very bad weather, or when the ship steered with difficulty, it would be no imputation upon him, provided he could steer his trick creditably under ordinary circumstances. ”

“ It is not necessary that an able seaman should be a navigator; but every navigator should be an able seaman. Such a man likewise should be something of a sailmaker, rigger and shipbuilder. In these days when the work of a crew is so divided that men are stationed at certain work in all weathers few men before the mast are all-round seamen. And this is likewise regrettable.
In the months I had spent upon the Scarboro I had learned much—and in that I had the advantage of Thank. Captain Rogers and Mr. ”

“ They flourish when the sailor is much better able to look after himself. But their help is needed still; and what they have done in the past has not been the least among the influences which have made the common lot of the seaman so very much better than it was. ”

“ Then he must secure all the gear to the sail properly, sheets, clew-lines, and bunt-lines, loose the sail, sing out "Sheet home the royal," "light up" the gear, and, when the [Pg 291] sail is set, "stop" it loosely with one turn of roping-twine, so that it will not chafe the sail by being stretched tightly over it, and come down. If he can do all that smartly and well, in spite of the ship's uneasy motion, he is superior to two-thirds of the so-called able seamen of to-day.
In the absence of a boy, the ordinary seaman is also the lackey of the watch in an English ship. ”

“ Though the old salt may sneer at the freshwater sailor who scarcely need know how to box the compass, to whom the art of navigation is in the main the simple practise of steering from port to port guided by headlands and lights, who is seldom long out of sight of land, and never far from aid, yet the perils of the lakes are quite as real as those which confront the ocean seaman, and the skill and courage necessary for withstanding them quite as great as his. The sailor's greatest safeguard in time of tempest is plenty of searoom. ”

“ He should be adept at handling his ship around a dock, and must be equally adept at making her fast alongside pier or quay. He must know what to do in case of collision, in case of fire, in case any of a score of contingencies arise. He must be familiar with first aid and the use of medicines, for few ships carry doctors. He must be seaman enough for all his crew, for on him rests a great responsibility—the responsibility for a great and costly machine, for valuable cargoes, for the health, and even for the lives, of many men. ”

“ I have written that little sketch to show you that knowing how to hand, reef and steer is not all that is needed to make a seaman. The knowledge of the methods of working sails and ship are only a part of the seaman's craft. His head as well as his hand must be trained. He must not only know his vessel thoroughly, but he must as thoroughly know himself. ”

“ A sailor considering himself at home in every clime; well-knowing that however little employment there may be for other professions, the ways of commerce will always supply him with a berth sufficient to provide for all his wants. The better the seaman, generally, the more wild and reckless are his frolics; never learning wisdom, or staying his rollicking career, until the blue waves of old ocean close over his sinking form, [Pg 213] or he is hove down in some foreign hospital, a prey to disease brought on by his own imprudence. ”

“ I do not mean to cast a stigma on the well-won reputation of seamen for courage, but from the discipline of a well-regulated ship, the seaman is taught to look up to his officers, who, in his eyes, bear all the responsibility, and thus in a measure he regulates all his motions by that of his superior, and if anything goes wrong, imputes the error to its proper source. ”

“ If it be our duty to ascertain that a sailor can "hand, reef, and steer," before we place against his name these mystical letters, might we not well superadd, as a qualification, that he should also be able to keep his head above water, in the event of falling overboard, or that he should have it in his power to save another's life, if required to leap into the sea for that purpose by the orders of his superior? ”

“ He may ask advice, but he must act upon his own account, and is equally answerable for what he does himself, and what he permits to be done on board his vessel by others. The seaman is entitled to be dealt with by his own captain, under whom he shipped, and whom he may hold responsible at the end of the voyage ”

“ No other sea-folk combine so completely all the qualities that go to make up the perfect seaman. Many of them may be met with who can build a vessel, make her spars, her sails, and her rigging, do the blacksmith work and all the manifold varieties of odd workmanship that go to complete a ship’s equipment, take her to sea, and navigate her on soundest mathematical principles, and do all these strange acts and deeds with the poorest, most primitive tools, and under the most miserable,190 poverty-stricken conditions. ”

“ Still, the point may be raised that only in our actual seafaring are we recognized. We are poor citizens, nomads, who have little part with settled grooves and communal life on shore. The naval seaman is a known figure on the streets. His trim uniform, the cut of his hair, the swing of a muscular figure, his high spirits, are all in part with a stereotyped conception. ”

“ It is not in books or at the library table that the art of the seaman can be acquired. Quickness of eye, nerve, promptitude of judgment, are the indispensable gifts, which must be gained by long and varied experience at sea. The seamanship required in a gale of wind on the open ocean, the seamanship displayed in sailing matches in over-sparred yachts, sailed mainly in smooth waters, and the seamanship called for in pilotage waters not previously visited, and especially at night, are different branches of a wide profession. ”

“ Whatever knowledge a boy may have acquired, or whatever may be his age or strength, so long as he is rated as a boy, (and the rates are not changed during a voyage unless a person changes his ship,) he must do the inferior duties of a boy. If decks are to be cleared up or swept, rigging to be coiled up, a man is to be helped in his job, or any duty to be done aloft or about decks which does not require the strength or skill of a seaman, a boy is always expected to start first and do it, though not called upon by name. ”

“ Now, in peace-time, in order to "ship one's stripe" it is only necessary to pass an oral examination in navigation, and an oral and written examination in seamanship. This accomplished, the newly fledged Acting Sub. automatically retires to the "beach," where he passes through gunnery, navigation, and torpedo schools undistracted by [91] any of the executive duties of shipboard life, and able to concentrate his whole attention on each subject in turn. How beautifully simple! But in time of war it is a very different proposition. ”

“ But the finest and, in fact, the only way to make good seamen is to take them for long voyages. And so, in spite of the fact that less than a century and a half later the type of ships had scarcely changed, yet there is an evident improvement in the seaman’s skill. For everyone must concede that to take a fleet of over a hundred twelfth-century ships on such a long voyage as from Dartmouth to the Holy Land was in itself a very fine feat of endurance and skill. ”

“ With infinite ingenuity and foresight sea-gangs were picketed from harbour to harbour, from headland to headland, until they formed an almost unbroken chain around the coasts and guarded the sailor's every point of accustomed approach from overseas: This was the outer cordon of the system, the beginning of the gauntlet the returning sailor had to run, and he was a smart seaman indeed who could successfully negotiate the uncharted rocks and shoals with which the coast was everywhere strewn in his despite. ”

“ While we, the foreign-going men, have our 'ins and outs' of the most dangerous seas—serving our turn in the front-line sea-trenches, then retiring to a rest in safer and more distant waters—the coastal seaman has no such relief. His [80] daily duty lies in the storm-centre, in the very midst of the sea-war. From harbour mouth to the booms of his port of entry, no course can be steered that does not drive his keel through minable areas and across the ranges of lurking submarines. ”

“ The number of trained and experienced men which such a complicated machine as a modern war-ship or first-class passenger vessel requires, is very great. There is less need for old-fashioned sailors—who could go aloft in any weather to reef and furl—but there is seamanship still required to navigate, to heave the lead, to man and manage boats, and many other things, beside the mere drilling and working of artillery and small arms. It requires some training even to be able to take care of one’s self in bad weather, especially in a large ship, where places to hold on are far apart. ”