Galleot

“ Now the deck of Magro's ship is flush with the water, and the Romans, drawn towards it by the iron bonds which held them, are tilted downwards, one bulwark upon the waves, one reared high in the air. Madly they strain to cast off the death grip of the galley. She is under the surface now, and ever swifter, with the greater weight, the Roman ships heel after her. There is a rending crash. The wooden side is torn out of one, and mutilated, dismembered, she rights herself, and lies a helpless thing upon the water. ”

“ I judged that this galley, which was under sail when first sighted, had come out from Cartagena in search of us, and from the fact that she did not at once bear down upon us, but hung persistently to windward, I conjectured that she was not alone, that she had one or more consorts somewhere to windward, and that, upon fully identifying the galleon, she would lower her sails, out sweeps, and be off to windward for help to tackle us. ”

“ The word gallevat seems to come directly from the galeota of the Portuguese and other S. European nations, a kind of inferior galley with only one bank of oars, which appears under the form galion in Joinville, infra (not to be confounded with the galleons of a later period, which were larger vessels) , and often in the 13th and 14th centuries as galeota, galiotes, &c. It is constantly mentioned as forming part of the Portuguese fleets in India. Bluteau defines galeota as "a small galley with one mast, and with 15 or 20 benches a side, and one oar to each bench." ”

“ Put out to sea and capture that accursed black galley. String up the whole of its crew from its own yardarms and the devil take their souls. Tomorrow at daybreak I want the four galleys that are lying here at anchor to weigh anchor. Do you hear me, gentlemen? The Andrea Doria will stay here and await further orders. But the galleys will make sail tomorrow good and early. The message has already been given to the ships' captains at Sluys to put out to sea with every ship available. The black galley—bring me the black galley or bring me back Satan himself. ”

“ The Barbary vessels were in general large, narrow rowboats, carrying usually two masts, with the lateen sail of the Mediterranean for use in fair winds. The name “galley” was applied in Europe to the largest of such in ordinary use. There was, however, a much larger development in the galleasse, some few of which, used by the Neapolitans, carried 700 men, 300 of whom would be convicts at the oars. There was finally the galleon, the precursor of the frigate, which had masts and sails alone for propulsion. In the large galleys there might be as many as six men at an oar. ”

“ As the corsair saw what a brave defense they made against the small boats, he bore down upon them with his whole fleet, consisting of sixty-two large ships, and with their great fire-bombs they burned the galley in a very short time. The poor fellows in it not having confidence in their oars—as they had only four oars to a bench, the galliot having fifteen benches—those still living threw themselves into the water. Thus they all perished, either at the hands of the Chinese or at those of the natives, who are wont to act in this manner. ”

“ The English “jolly-boat,” a small bluff-bowed, wide-transomed ship’s boat, swung at the stern of a vessel for ready use, is probably a corruption of the Danish form of the word jolle. Other authorities take it to be a corruption of a late 15th-century jolywat, a small ship’s boat, which is supposed to represent galiote, galliot (see Galley) . A galliot, however, was never a small boat, but an independent vessel propelled by oars or sails. ”

“ For twenty minutes the galliot cleft the waters on her old course, when the look-out screamed: “Hard up!—rocks and breakers dead ahead!”
“Put down the helm!” yelled the confused second mate;—but the galliot lost her headway, and, taken aback, shaved the edge of a foam-covered rock, dropping astern on a reef with seven feet water around her.
All was consternation;—sails flapping; breakers roaring; ropes snapping and beating; masts creaking; hull thumping; men shouting! The captain and his wife were on deck in the wink of an eye. Every one issued an order and no one obeyed. ”

“ A little farther off behind a projecting screen of rock that formed a little haven two enormous masted galleys, each of fifty oars, and a smaller galliot of thirty rode gently on the slight heave of the water, the vast yellow oars standing out almost horizontally from the sides of each vessel like the pinions of some gigantic bird. ”

“ My galley charged with forgetfulness
Thorough sharp seas, in winter nights doth pass
'Tween rock and rock; and eke mine enemy, alas,
That is my lord, steereth with cruelness;
And every oar a thought in readiness,
As though that death were light in such a case.
An endless wind doth tear the sail apace
Of forced sighs and trusty fearfulness.
A rain of tears, a cloud of dark disdain,
Hath done the wearied cords great hinderance;
Wreathed with error and eke with ignorance.
The stars be hid that led me to this pain.
Drowned is reason that should me consort,
And I remain despairing of the port. ”

“ On a large galley, besides 270 rowers, there was a mixed crew of about 75 men, together with 50 or 60 soldiers; so that the whole equipment of a fighting-galley must have reached about 400 men. A galleas originally was a large, heavy galley, but later it became a sailing ship, as was the galleon of the Spaniards. ”

“ Let one picture to himself about one hundred and thirty Moorish, Turk, or Christian galley-slaves, dressed in red jackets and brown woollen hooded mantles, on this black galley, in cold, gloomy weather.
These miserable creatures shivered under the icy blast of the tempest and under the rain, which deluged them notwithstanding the awning.
To warm themselves a little they would press close to each other on the narrow benches, to which they were chained, five and five. ”

“ The Dutch galliot is a somewhat peculiar craft to the eye of an Englishman; heavy and clumsy-looking beyond doubt, but a good sea-boat notwithstanding. The galliot looks much the same, whether you regard her from stem or from stern, both being almost equally rounded. Keel she has scarce any; her floors are flat, hull broad and deep, and rudder very wide. Hung on each side is a large lee-board, to keep her from making too much leeway. Her hull is varnished a bright yellow colour, and shines in the sun. Her bulwarks are lofty ”

“ The galley has always been the type of business ship on the Mediterranean. All through the classical wars the rowing galley was the mainstay of power. The Homeric catalogue of ships, the Phœnician coinage, the Assyrian sculptures, the Greek fleets, the Carthaginian navy and its destroyers of Rome, the pirates of Liburnia and Lycia, down to the Venetian fleet and the French galleys of a couple of centuries ago, all show the dominance of the oar. ”

“ After having traced the Gaul for so long in the field, we love to follow him into his cabin—to observe his appearance, his pursuits, his habits—to mark the manly figure, the fair complexion, the flowing yellow locks, the glittering helmet surmounted with the antlers of the stag, the buckler covered with all the colours of the rainbow, the polished cuirass flashing back the rays of the morning sun, the heavy sabre hanging from the gold-bespangled belt, the precious necklace, the rich armlets, the bright and variegated hues of the martial sagum or mantle, of the noble Gaulish warrior. ”

“ By carefully guarding against raising a smoke during the day with our fires, we should greatly diminish the chances of being discovered, and at night we would keep no fire. We could lower the masts of the boats, and by mooring them a little farther up they would be partly hidden by the willows. So, too, as to the galleon; unless one actually climbed upon the rocks and looked down into the basin, there was nothing in the external appearance of the place from sea or shore to denote its existence. ”

“ A Celtic or megalithic monument, more commonly called Tumulus.
Galiot, Galliot (dimin. of galère) . A ship moved by both sails and oars.
Gall (A.S. gealla) . In an animal, a bitter yellowish green fluid secreted by the gall-bladder. Ox-gall, clarified by boiling with animal charcoal and filtering, is used in water-colour and in ivory painting to make the colours spread more evenly upon the paper, ivory, &c.: mixed with gum-arabic it thickens, and fixes the colours. A coating of it sets black-lead or crayon drawings. ”

“ A week later, in a strait between two islands like tinted clouds, we fought a very great galleon from sunrise to noon, pierced her hull through and through and silenced her ordnance, then boarded her and found a king's ransom in gold and silver. When the fighting had ceased and the treasure was ours, then we four stood side by side on the deck of the slowly sinking galleon, in front of our prisoners,—of the men who had fought well, of the ashen priests and the trembling women. ”

“ For this purpose, a magnificent galley was built, encrusted with gold, silver, and precious stones. This floating bijou was called the Bucentaure, was guarded in the arsenal, whence it was removed on the eve of the Ascension. Next day the Doge, the patriarch, and the Council of Ten embarked, and the galley was towed out to the open sea, but not far from the shore. ”

“ The species should be named the ‘queen rail,’ for the female is without doubt the head of the family. Is it not she who sometimes takes possession of the homes of her meek neighbors, the gallinules? Is it not she who defends her home so spiritedly when it is threatened? Hence it seems to me that the King Rail is more king by marriage than in his own right. She lords it over the gentle-spirited mudhens with whom she dwells, and frequently saves herself the labor of making a nest and the time to lay so many eggs, by appropriating both nest and eggs of a comfortably settled gallinule. ”

“ Transferred to one of King Philip's great galleons, I was taken once more to the Spanish Indies; but by God's providence the galleon was captured on the high seas by Captain Ned Horseley, the English buccaneer, and I was by him handed over to Captain Francis Drake. Under Drake, so please you, I served at the attack on Nombre de Dios, and at the taking of Porto Bello in the year seventy-two. Again I fell into the hands of our enemies, and was for eight long years in the Everlasting Prison Remediless in Hispaniola; since when I have been in the Indies—in Darien, in Brazil, in Virginia. ”

“ The two essential steps were quickly taken: first, from oared galleys with very little sail power to the hybrid galleasse with much more sail and much less in the way of oars; secondly, from this to the purely sailing galleon.
With the galleon we enter the age of sailing tactics which decided the fate of the oversea world. This momentous age began with Drake and the English galleon. It ended with Nelson and the first-rate, three-decker, ship-of-the-line. But it was one throughout; for its beginning differed from its end no more than a father differs from his son. ”

“ Loose again, as one not yet gallows-ripe.
Gallus.—See Gallows.
Gally-foist.—See Galley-foist.
Gallyslopes, subs. (Old Cant) .—Breeches. For synonyms, see Kicks.
Galoot (also galloot and geeloot) , subs. (general) .—A man (sometimes in contempt) ; also (in America) a worthless fellow (or thing, see quot. 1888) ; a rowdy; a cad (q.v.) .
1835. Marryat, Jacob Faithful, ch. xxxiv. Four greater galloots were never picked up, but never mind that.
1869. S. L. Clemens (Mark Twain) Innocents at Home, p. 22. He could lam any galoot of his inches in America. ”

“ The number of oars or sweeps varied, the larger galley having twenty-five on each side; the galleass as many as thirty-two, each being worked by several men. This labour was from the earliest times often performed by slaves or prisoners of war. It became the custom among the Mediterranean powers to sentence condemned criminals to row in the war galleys of the state. Traces of this in France can be found as early as 1532, but the first legislative enactment is in the Ordonnance d’Orléans of 1561. In 1564 Charles IX. forbade the sentencing of prisoners to the galleys for less than ten years. ”

“ They were men of commanding stature, with pointed hats, large red sashes, velvet breeches, leather gaiters and characteristic features, encircled by enormous black whiskers, all which made them look more like robbers than guards and whom it was a cunning contrivance to take with you, in order to avoid meeting them on the road.
Twenty soldiers huddled together in a galley, followed the correo real. A galley is a two or four wheeled cart, without springs, and having its bottom formed of an esparto network, instead of boards. ”

“ At last after a weary wait the tide reached its lowest, and as I feared, we found that we dared not go into the race-way with the boat. Each swell swept through it with a great rush, breaking into foam in the narrower part, so that a boat would have been dashed to pieces unless fortunate enough to swim fairly out through the exit, and would then be extremely liable to be overwhelmed. We drew up to the rock which lay adjoining the beach and landed, so that we might look down on the galleon from above. ”

“ We clear the broad meadows. Our very horses, with ears erect, gather speed with every bound, and seem ready to cry ha! ha! We are the fabled centaurs of old.
See! see!—the heavy morning mist, rising in huge volumes, reluctantly bares the forest on the mountain side,—it curls and breaks in vast masses,—it slowly rolls off to the eastward. Aye! there he stands—there stands old Holyoke, with his cragged coronal of rocks, a gigantic Titan, bidding defiance to time and tempest. Gallop—gallop! we are within two hundred feet of the summit. ”