_"Derrick" and "Ship's Painter."_--The following Note may perhaps interest
some of your readers:--The ancient British word _derrick_, or some such
word, still exists in our marine. It is used in sea phrase to define a
crane for temporary purposes, and is not unusually represented by a single
spar, which is stepped near a hatchway, provided with a tackle or purchase,
in order to the removal of goods from the hold of a vessel. The use of
_Derry_, both as a termination in the names of places, and in the old
ballad chorus of _Down derry down_, is familiar to every one.
Some other of our sea terms might receive apt illustration in "N. & Q.;"
and I should beg to suggest "unde derivatur" a boat's _painter_,--the name
of the rope which confines a ship's boat to the vessel, when at sea.
Turner gave a world-wide interest to the phrase when he called, in his
eccentric manner, one of his finest marine pictures "Now for the painter."