Log (ship)

“ This operation is repeated as often as is necessary to cover the three or four miles between ship and shore, until at last the long line of tumbling logs are brought alongside their destined vessel, and secured to the big spar on the forecastle. At whatever time they arrive all hands must turn out to receive them, and on board the American ships the uproar used to be fearful ”

“ They would look eagerly seawards over the bows, gazing thus for long minutes at a time. Whenever the log was hove I'd mark one or more inquire the speed of the men who had held the reel or dragged in the line, as they went forward. They smoked incessantly, with an air of dull and heavy satisfaction in their faces.
I observed a lifting, so to speak, of the stupor off Vanderdecken. ”

“ Outside the harbour and clear of the defences Boyd put her on her southerly course, and the log was streamed. Not a log that tows astern like that of a surface ship, but a long cylindrical tube carrying vanes at its lower end, which is lowered through a hole in the bottom of the boat and packed to prevent leakage. The Destroyer shot ahead at her twenty knots (it was nothing to her, as she was one of the latest class, and capable of a good deal more) and began her zig-zag. ”

“ As late as 1861 an exploring ship was visited by natives of Western Australia, riding simple rough logs. To smooth and sharpen the log’s end and then to hollow it out has been thought to be the first step taken by primitive man in his progress toward a boat; but I think the dugout probably came later, or at any rate no earlier, than the folding of bark into a trough and tying up the ends, as some savages are still content to do. In North America, where materials were favorable, this germ developed into the very highest type of canoe—the Algonkin birch-bark. ”

“ The sailor dropped overboard, a boat unsuccessfully searched for him, and then the ship braced her mainyard round and sailed away. But extracts from log-books, I have taken notice, are like the little box which the fisherman in the “Arabian Nights” found{125} upon the sea-shore; when it was opened a wonderful creature shaped itself out, and its figure filled the sky. I particularly realized this when Mr. Bowling gave me a sketch of the yarn of which Captain Braddick’s log is the briefest hint. Why, what a world of adventure, of heroism, of peril grows up out of these marine entries! ”

“ But in Kelly and Woodes Rogers' days the log chip, reel, line, and half minute glass were the mariner's sole means of finding his longitude, or distance, sailed east or west.
Steam and patent logs have much simplified such calculations, which required many corrections not only for leeway but for errors in the log line and glass; "Shortness of the knots in a line," says Kelly, "being on the safer side, that a ship be not ahead of her reckoning; it being better to look for land before we come at it than to be ashoar before we expect it." ”

“ Meanwhile the ship is spinning along very nearly at the same rate as at first, though two-thirds of the canvas have been taken off her. These variations in speed are odd enough, and, at times, not easily accounted for. When the breeze first comes on, all sail set, and the water quite smooth, the ship can be steered on a straight course without any difficulty, and she really seems to fly. When the log is hove, it is discovered, we shall suppose, that she is going eleven knots. Well, the wind increases, and in come the studding-sails ”

“ Dead reckoning means briefly the finding out of the speed of a ship through the water per hour by means of a contrivance called the reel log. When the speed is ascertained it is entered in the log book. Allowance is then made for what is called lee-way, if any lee-way exist, and the sum of the speed, together with the courses which may have been steered, enables the mariner to mark down upon his chart with more or less accuracy the points of latitude or longitude at which his ship has arrived. ”

“ The ship, now distant not more than half a mile, came surging on, with her broad expanse of canvas fully distended by the following gale, and straining at the stout spars and tough hemp rigging as though it would tear the very masts themselves out of the hull and come flying down to leeward like cobwebs before a summer breeze; or as though, when the ship rose upon the ridge of a sea, lifting her fore-foot and some forty feet of her keel clear out of the water, she would take flight, and, leaving the sea altogether, soar away upon her canvas pinions like a startled sea-fowl. ”

“ Perhaps it may be necessary to state that a Log is the official document in which the progress of the ship from hour to hour is recorded, with such official notes as the alteration in sail carried, expenditure of provisions and stores, etc. A Journal contains this information in a condensed form, with such observations as the officer keeping it may feel inclined to insert.
The ship's Log Book of the Endeavour is in the British Museum. Mr. R. M. Hudson of Sunderland possesses Cook's own log, not autograph however, presented by Cook to Sir Hugh Palliser, the ancestor of his wife. ”

“ Such information will be valuable in aiding her to find her friends.”
I thought well of that idea, and promised to do so; though I wondered how the mate knew I kept a log. I had taken notes of my adventures ever since I had been blown out to sea on my little sloop, the Wavecrest; but at this time I did not know what an aid to memory a log—or [159] diary—would be. By the way, a seaman never calls it “logbook;” the daybook of a ship at sea is merely a “log.” One of the most popular magazines published has a correspondence department called “The Logbook,” and that makes the sailor smile! ”

“ It generally takes four or five men to pull the line in. These men walk along the deck, one behind the other, with the line over their shoulders; and at first they have to tug very hard. The reel man winds [Pg 166] the line upon the reel as fast as they draw it in. It comes in more and more easily as the part that is in the water grows shorter; and at length the log itself is soon skipping through the foam in the wake of the ship, until it comes up out of the water and is taken on board. ”

“ The chief differences which appear in the several “counterfeit presentments” of the historic ship are in the number of her masts and the height of her poop and her forecastle. A few make her a brig or “snow” of the oldest pattern, while others depict her as a full-rigged ship, sometimes having the auxiliary rig of a small “jigger” or “dandy-mast,” with square or lateen sail, on peak of stern, or on the bow sprit, or both, though usually her mizzenmast is set well aft upon the poop. ”

“ In order to avoid taking the keel out of the log, and to have all the depth possible, they put on a false keel of oak; as the edge was too thin to put on row-locks, they fastened cleats on the inside, and put flat thole-pins in between them and the side, which looked neat, and were strong enough for so light, easy-going a craft, that was intended for sailing rather than carrying ”

“ Got my log line strung up along 'tween decks and the whole blamed wash triced up in everybody's way. If I want to heave the log at 8 bells, overboard goes the wash, and don't care who likes it; I'm boss here. 8 bells. Didn't heave the log—Guess we're making four knots; wind fresh.
Course E. S. E. Shem at the wheel, Japheth on the lookout.
Wed., 9 days out. Ironing day; blowing a gale of wind; women are making hard work of it and getting seasick—Hove to at 8 bells this morning; lays easy; kicked Ham away from the wheel and steered his trick; afraid I can't make a sailor of him ”

“ The speed of vessels can be tolerably well calculated from the number of revolutions of the screw.
"Now," said the Captain, turning to the third officer, who was also on the bridge, "what was the last record of the chip log?"
"Twenty knots, sir."
"Common log is not much good at high speeds," commented the Captain.
The common log consists of a triangular wooden float, a line marked with knots at equal distances apart, and a reel. The float is thrown overboard, and the line allowed to run off the reel for a certain number of seconds. ”

“ When, at last, the log showed above the rail, if she started her antics, all hands near stood by for a run, for the log would suddenly slue inboard, and come across the deck like a gigantic battering ram. The whole process was a series of hairbreadth escapes. Down in the hold, where the stevedores toiled with tackles, rousing the logs about, there were many casualties; but these dagoes never seemed to care. For every hurt they had one remedy: [55] plenty of "caña," a fiery white spirit, fresh from the still. ”

“ Along either bank, among the bushes, on sandbars, and in trees, hundreds and hundreds of logs had been stranded when the main drive passed. These logs the rear crew were engaged in restoring to the current.
And as a man had to be able to ride any kind of a log in any water; to propel that log by jumping on it, by rolling it squirrel fashion with the feet, by punting it as one would a canoe; to be skillful in pushing, prying, and poling other logs from the quarter deck of the same cranky craft ”

“ When the logs reach the sea, they are shipped to various parts of the world where timber is scarce. Large quantities are imported into Great Britain from Canada and other parts of America.
A bold thing has occasionally been done. Instead of shipping the logs in vessels, enterprising and ingenious men built them into a solid ship, leaving a small space to serve as a cabin and a hold for provisions; then, erecting masts, they hoisted sail, and in this singular craft crossed the Atlantic. On arriving at port they broke up their raft-ship and sold it. ”

“ Their own row-boats are heavy, square at both ends, and clumsy to row, but as I have said, they are out in them in the spring before the floating ice is out of the river, rescuing logs and fragments of lumber from between the ice-cakes.
There is a good deal to the business of picking up logs. The price for returning 26 “strays” to the right owners is ten cents a log (the rate increasing as you go down stream) , and a good many can be towed at once by a small boat. The price per log rises to twenty-five cents, near the sea. ”

“ The coast Indians are splendid sailors, and their dugouts do not always come off second best in racing with the boats of white men. With a primitive yet ingeniously made [257] tool, like an adze, in the construction of which a blade is tied fast to a bent handle of bone, these natives laboriously pick out the heart of a great cedar log, and shape its outer sides into the form of a boat. When the log is properly hollowed, they fill it with water, and then drop in stones which they have heated in a fire. ”

“ These are smooth slimy logs that a white man would find it difficult to sit on if they were on shore, and in this water they would turn with him only once—the log would go one way and the man another. But these fellows are in no fear of the rocks below; they easily guide their barks out of the rushing floods, through the whirlpools and eddies, into the slack shore-water in the rear of the boat, and stand up like men and demand backsheesh. These logs are popular ferry-boats in the Upper Nile ”

“ The very nature of log is, not only to float, but to remain sluggish or stationary in the water: and as it might not be convenient to provide a fresh log (or chip) for every occasion, there would be a clear advantage in tying a string to it, for the purpose of hauling it inboard again, to serve another turn. Moreover, I must remind A. L. that sailors do not say, "Heave the chip," but "Heave the log."
This same passage in the Comedy of Errors suggests another consideration; which is, that Shakspeare appears to have used league and mile synonymously. ”

“ Six feet by twelve is a fair size. The smaller the logs the larger the raft must be in order to carry any weight, for it must cover a wider surface of water than is [217] necessary for one made of large logs. One good-sized log will carry your weight easily, but a small one will sink beneath you.
If you have two long, strong ropes you can use them for binding the logs together; if not you must make the ropes from fibre of some kind. Daniel C. Beard in his book, "Boat-Building and Boating," tells of making a very strong rope of the inner bark of a chestnut-tree which had been killed by fire. ”

“ Sometimes, in the big river, when we would be feeling our way cautiously along through a fog, the deep hush would suddenly be broken by yells and a clamor of tin pans, and all in instant a log raft would appear vaguely through the webby veil, close upon us; and then we did not wait to swap knives, but snatched our engine bells out by the roots and piled on all the steam we had, to scramble out of the way! One doesn't hit a rock or a solid log craft with a steamboat when he can get excused. ”

“ It is impracticable to give dimensions, for the reason that they are relative; the length of the middle log depends, to some extent, upon its diameter, it being evident that a thick log will support more than a thin one of the same length; consequently if your log is of small diameter, it must be longer, in order to support your weight, than will be necessary for a thicker piece of timber. The point to remember is to select a log which will support you and your pack, and then attach two side floats to balance your craft and prevent it from rolling over and dumping its load in the water. ”