THE ELIZABETHAN AGE
The seamanship, the navigation, and the gunnery of the Elizabethan
age will ever be memorable, not merely because they attained such
excellence after centuries of imperfection, but because by a
combination of these three arts the whole future of England was mapped
out, her supremacy assured, and her colonial expansion begun.
A four-masted warship of her reign was not a handy creature to control.
She could fight and she could ride out an Atlantic gale, but she was
clumsy; she was--even the best of her class--much addicted to rolling,
owing to the fact that she possessed such immense weights above the
water-line. She was certainly an improvement on the ships of Henry
VII and VIII, but she was too cumbrous to be considered in any degree
satisfactory. Before we proceed to discuss the way they were handled,
let us briefly survey the principal types of vessels on board which the
men of this reign had to serve.
[Illustration: SIXTEENTH-CENTURY FOUR-MASTED SHIP.
By a Contemporary Artist.]
[Illustration: ELIZABETHANS BOARDING AN ENEMY’S SHIP.]
There was, firstly, the “high-charged” man-of-war with her lofty poop
and forecastle. A contemporary illustration shows such a vessel with
guns protruding from the stern and two tiers of guns running along
either side of the ship. There were light guns in the forecastle as
well. That portion on the main deck between the break of the poop and
forecastle was the waist, where the crew moved about and the ship’s
boats were stowed. In those days, when so much of the fighting was
done at close quarters, and the enemy endeavoured so to manœuvre
his ship as to come alongside and pour his men on the other’s deck,
dealing out slaughter to all who should bar his way, it was the aim of
the attacked ship to catch the invaders between two fires. The poop
and forecastle being so well guarded and, by reason of their height,
so difficult to assault, the enemy might possibly board the ship at
the waist. But inasmuch as the after bulkhead of the forecastle and
the forward bulkhead of the poop were pierced for quick-firing guns,
the boarding party was likely to meet with a warm reception. As an
additional obstacle to boarding, it was customary before a fight to
stretch long red cloths over the waist. These cloths were edged on
each side with calico, says an Elizabethan writer, and were allowed to
hang several feet over the side all round the ship, being sometimes
ornamented with devices or painted in various colours. Wooden barriers,
called “close-fights,” were also built across the ship’s deck for
repelling boarders, and were loopholed like the bulkheads. Furthermore,
nettings were stretched across the ship to prevent any falling spars
from dealing death to the crew.
The tumble-home on these ships was excessive, but since they carried
so many decks it was essential that the topmost should be as light
as possible. But just as on a modern steamship the master can survey
everything forward from the eminence of his bridge, so the Elizabethan
captain, standing on the poop, was able to command the whole ship, to
see ahead and to keep an eye on his men. There was no uniform colour
for painting the Elizabethan hulls, Mr. Oppenheim says. Black and
white, the Tudor colours green and white, red, and timber colour were
all used. Sometimes a dragon or a lion gilded was at the beak-head,
with the royal arms at the stern. On either side of the stern was a
short gallery, on to which the captain could emerge from his cabin
under the poop. The long tiller from the rudder came in under the poop,
and was controlled by a bar or whipstaff attached to this same tiller.
“The roul,” says James Lightbody in his “Mariner’s Jewel,” published
in 1695, “is that through which the whipstaff goeth, which is a piece
of wood the steersman holdeth in his hand to steer withal.” The man
received his orders, as a rule, from the master of the ship, but when
entering port the pilot would instruct him how to steer.
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION TO SHOW AN ELIZABETHAN HELMSMAN STEERING A
SHIP BY MEANS OF WHIPSTAFF.
(Sketched on board the replica of the _Revenge_ at Earl’s Court.)]
There was not very much room in the fo’k’sle--just enough to sleep a
few of the crew and for stowing coils of rope and the like. The galley
was erected at the bottom of the hold on a brick floor. Below the
upper deck came the main deck. Here were disposed the heavier guns,
and here the crew were berthed. Between this and the hold was a false
orlop, where the bread-room and the cabins of the petty officers were
placed. But what was perhaps especially noticeable about these ships
was the extent to which the poop and the beak projected away from the
hull. Consequently, not only did these craft roll, but they pitched
considerably as well. The interiors of the cabins were painted green,
and there was a certain amount of carving externally both at beak and
stern. So much for the “high-charged” type of ship.
But there was also the pinnesse or flush-decked species, such a craft
as brought home to England the body of Sir Philip Sidney, and such a
craft as often formed a unit in those long, perilous transatlantic
voyages of discovery. These craft had no raised forecastle other than a
small platform, and only a short quarter-deck. There was no such thing
as triangular sails on the full-rigged ships of those days. There was,
indeed, a spritsail, which was a squaresail set on a yard depending
from the long, steeved bowsprit, and this was the only headsail.
The foremast and mainmast each set a course and topsail, while the
mizzen and bonaventure each carried a lateen fore-and-aft sail. The
fore-topmast and main-topmast could be struck if necessary. Elizabethan
prints show, situated just above the lower yard on the bigger ships,
a round top or platform from which quick-firing guns and arrows could
be fired. At the yard-arms were sometimes fitted hooks, which, catching
the enemy’s rigging and sails, would do him considerable damage.
[Illustration: SIXTEENTH-CENTURY SHIP CHASING A GALLEY.
By a Contemporary Artist. The lead of the ropes, the parrals round the
masts, the rigging and other details are here most instructively shown.]
The following represent the different types of “great ordinance”
carried by a ship of war at this period:--
ARMAMENT OF AN ELIZABETHAN SHIP
Weight Shot
Ordnance. in lbs. in lbs.
Cannon 8000 63
Demi-cannon 6000 32
Culverin 5500 18
Demi-culverin 4500 9
Saker 3500 5¼
Minion 1500 4
Falcon 1100 2¼
Falconet 500 1¼
But it was seldom that any ordnance greater than a demi-cannon was used
on board ship.
The guns were made of brass or iron, and were mounted on wooden
carriages which had four wheels. They could be run in and out by means
of tackles. In his interesting little book, “The Arte of Shooting in
Great Ordnance,” by William Bourne, published in 1587, the author
significantly speaks of “this barbarous and rude thing called the
Art of Shooting in great Ordnaunce.” This was the period, you will
remember, when arrows, bills, and pikes had not yet lost their
admirers. He tells you in his preface that he has written this book
because “we English men haue not beene counted but of late daies to
become good Gunners, and the principall point that hath caused English
men to be counted good Gunners hath been for that they are hardie or
without fear about their ordnaunce: but for the knowledg in it other
nations and countries haue tasted better therof, as the Italians,
French, and Spaniardes, for that the English men haue had but little
instruction but that they haue learned of the Doutchmen, or Flemings in
the time of King Henry the eight.”
[Illustration: WAIST, QUARTER-DECK, AND POOP OF THE “REVENGE.”
(Elizabethan period.)]
[Illustration: SIXTEENTH-CENTURY THREE-MASTED SHIP.
By a Contemporary Artist. The date on the stern is 1564. Notice the man
in the maintop dowsing maintopsail.]
He goes into the subject with great thoroughness and points out that
allowance must be made for the wind, and how to secure good aim. The
cannon are to be placed so as to be right in the middle of the ports of
the ship, and care is to be taken that the wheels of the gun-carriage
are not made too high. He advises that when shooting from one ship
at another, if there is any sea on it is essential to have a good
helmsman “that can stirre steadie.” The best time to fire at the other
vessel is when the latter is “alofte on the toppe of the sea,” for then
“you have a bigger marke than when she is in the trough.” If the ship
rolls, “then the best place of the ship for to make a shotte is out of
the head or sterne.” The shorter ordnance is to be placed at the side
of the ship because they are lighter, and if the ship should heave
“wyth the bearyng of a Sayle that you must shutte the portes,” then you
can easily take the guns in.
“In lyke manner,” he proceeds, “the shorter that the peece lyeth oute
of the shyppes syde, the lesse it shall annoy them in the tacklyng of
the Shippes Sayles, for if that the piece doe lye verye farre oute of
the Shyppes syde, then the Sheetes and Tackes, or the Bolynes wyll
alwayes bee foule of the Ordnaunce, whereby it maye muche annoy them in
foule weather.” Therefore the long guns are best placed so that they
are fired from the stern. But a gun so placed must be “verye farre oute
of the porte, or else in the shooting it may blowe up the Counter of
the Shyppes sterne.”
In another equally delightful volume entitled “Inventions or Devises,”
the same author tells his reader how to “arme” (i.e. protect) a “ship
of warre.” You are to keep your men as close as you may, and have
the bonnet off the sail or other canvas stretched along the waist
and decks, as I have shown on an earlier page. The forecastle and
poop, Bourne says, you may “arm” with “manlets or gownes” “to shaddow
your men”; so also the tops, “but now in these daies,” he adds, “the
topfight is unto little effect, since the use of Calivers or Muskets in
Ships,” for the latter could do so much damage. He therefore advises
against having many men in the tops. After alluding to the netting,
which I explained just now, Bourne suggests that the captain must send
the carpenter “into the holde of the Ship” “to stop any leake if any
chance. And also to send downe the Surgion into his Cabin, which ought
and must be in the holde of the ship.”
The supreme head of the ship was the captain, who was not necessarily
a navigator nor even a seaman; but he was the wielder of authority and
discipline. He it was who had to keep under control a crew that was
prone to swearing, blasphemy, violence, mutiny, and other sins. Sir
William Monson has left behind in his most interesting “Naval Tracts”
many an entertaining detail of sea life during the Elizabethan period,
and tells that a captain might punish a man by putting him in the
“billbows during pleasure,” ducking him at the yard-arm, hauling him
from yard-arm to yard-arm under the ship’s keel (otherwise known as
keel-hauling), fastening him to the capstan and flogging him there,
or else fastening him at the capstan or mainmast with weights hanging
about his neck till his poor heart and back were ready to break.
Another brutal punishment was to “gagg or scrape their tongues for
blasphemy or swearing.”
Elizabethan captains, says Monson, “were gentlemen of worth and
means, maintaining their diet at their own charge.” In a fight the
lieutenant had charge of the forecastle. It was not till the latter
part of Elizabeth’s reign that the rank of lieutenant was created for
the training of young gentlemen destined ultimately for command. He
came aboard quite “green” in order to learn what seamanship he could,
and to assist the captain in the discipline of the ship; but he was
not allowed to interfere with the navigation, which was entirely the
work of the master. Not unnaturally there was a good deal of friction
between the lieutenant and the master. Even the common seaman had an
ineradicable contempt for this landlubber, more especially in the
seventeenth century during the Anglo-Dutch wars.
[Illustration: RIDING BITTS ON THE GUN DECK OF THE “REVENGE.”
(Elizabethan period.)]
In his “Accidence, or The Path-way to Experience necessary for all
Young Seamen,” written by Captain John Smith, the first Governor of
Virginia, we have a great deal of information which tells us just what
we should wish to know. Of the captain and master we have already
spoken. The latter and his mates are to “commaund all the Saylors,
for steering, trimming, and sayling the Ship.” The pilot takes the
ship into harbour, the Cape-merchant and purser have charge of the
cargo, the master-gunner was responsible for all the munitions,
while the carpenter and his mate looked after the nails, pintles,
saws, and any caulking of seams as well as the splicing of masts and
yards. The boatswain had charge of the cordage, marlinespikes, and
sails, etc., while his mate had command of the longboat for laying
out kedge anchors and warping or mooring. The surgeon had to have a
certificate from the “Barber-surgeons Hall” “of his sufficiency,” and
his medicine-chest must be properly filled. The marshal was to punish
offenders, and the corporal was to see to the setting and relieving
of the watch. Every Monday the boatswain was to hear the boys box the
compass, after which they were to have a quarter can of beer and a
basket of bread.
The men messed in fours, fives, or sixes, and the steward’s duty was
“to deliuer out the victuall.” The quartermasters had charge of the
stowage, while a cooper was carried to look after the casks for wine
and beer, etc. The large ships had three boats, viz. (1) the boat, (2)
the cock, and (3) the skiff. These were respectively put in charge of
(1) the boatswain, (2) the cockswain, and (3) the skiffswain. Hence
the origin of these designations. A cook was carried, and he had his
store of “quarter cans, small cannes, platters, spoones, lanthornes,”
etc. The swabbers’ duties were to wash and keep clean the ship. But the
first man that was found telling a lie every Monday was indicted of
the offence at the mainmast and placed under the swabber to keep the
beak-head and chains clean. The sailors were the experienced mariners
who hoisted the sails, got the tacks aboard, hauled the bowlines,
and steered the ship; while the younkers were the young men called
“foremast men,” whose duty it was to take in topsails, furl and sling
the mainsail, and take their trick at the helm.
[Illustration: LONGITUDINAL PLAN OF AN EARLY SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY SHIP.
This contemporary design conveys an excellent idea of the interior
of an ocean-going vessel. Notice the pilot’s place at the stern; the
tiller and whip-staff; the capstan; the lower deck; the holds, etc.]
In those days the custom of dividing a ship’s company into watches was
already in vogue. “When you set sayle and put to sea, the Captaine is
to call up the company; and the one halfe is to goe to the Starreboord,
the other to the Larboord, as they are chosen: the Maister chusing
first one, then his Mate another, and so forward till they bee diuided
in two parts.” In those days the reckoning by tonnage was far from
reliable as indicating the true size of a ship. Columbus, after his
second voyage across the Atlantic, writes to Captain Antonio de Torres
of the ship _Marigalante_, and refers to the freighting of ships by the
ton “as the Flemish merchants do,” and this, he suggests, would be a
better and less expensive method than any other mode. But when after
the capture of a prize the division of shares was made, it was to the
advantage of the crew to make the tonnage as big as possible. The
custom was to allot the share in proportions. The ship took a third,
the victualler took another third, and the remaining third was divided
up among the crew. Of this latter third the captain received nine
shares, the master seven, and so on down to the boys who had one share,
and there was a reward given to the man who first descried the sails of
the ship ultimately captured. A reward was also paid to the first man
who rushed on board the enemy.
According to Monson, every man and boy was allowed 1 lb. of bread a day
and a gallon of beer a day, viz. a quart in the morning, a quart at
dinner, a quart in the afternoon, and a quart at supper. On flesh-days
each man could have 1 lb. of beef or else 1 lb. of “pork with pease.”
Flesh-days were Sundays, Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. The other
days were fish-days, and on these every mess of four men was allowed a
side of salt fish, “either haberdine, ling, or cod,” 7 oz. of butter,
and 14 oz. of cheese. Fridays were excepted, for on these days they
had but half allowance. Monson was naturally prejudiced against the
Spanish ships, which he accused of being badly kept--“like hog-sties
and sheep-coats”--and of giving an allowance of diet far too small.
Every man cooked for himself and there was no discipline, although they
carried more officers than the English ships. In the latter the captain
inspected his ship twice a day to see that she was kept sweet and clean
“for avoiding sickness,” but the holds were so badly ventilated, dark,
and smelly, the beer was so frequently bad, the food so often putrid,
and the crew themselves so lacking in habits of cleanliness, that
scurvy, dysentery, and other diseases frequently broke out and men died
in large numbers. One has only to look through the logs of some of the
Elizabethan voyages of discovery to see this for oneself.
[Illustration: A SIXTEENTH-CENTURY WARSHIP AT ANCHOR.
By a Contemporary Artist. Showing method of embarkation and many
fascinating details.]
In addition to the officers already mentioned must be given two more.
These were first the ship’s chaplain, who celebrated the Holy Communion
on Sundays, read prayers two or three times on week-days, preached, and
visited the sick and wounded. And secondly a trumpeter, who blew on his
silver instrument when the ship went into action, at the changing of
the watches, and at the coming and going of a distinguished guest. His
place was on the poop, and it was customary for “himself and his noise
to have banners of silk of the admiral’s colours.” The watch was set at
eight, and so on through the night and day. When on these occasions the
trumpeter sounded his blast he was to “have a can of beer allowed for
the same.”
And now that we have got some idea in our minds of the details of the
seaman’s life on board an Elizabethan ship, let us be rowed off from
the shore in one of her three boats which is bringing water and wood
and provisions. The good ship is lying to her anchor in the roadstead
about to get underway. Transport yourself, then, in imagination to that
epoch when England’s seamen made such wonderful history, and endeavour
to believe that the cock-boat actually bumps up alongside the English
galleon. You clamber up the ship’s side and find yourself on her deck,
where the crew are standing about ready to hear the commands of the
master. And now let us watch them get under way. I shall quote not from
fiction of to-day, but from an account written by an Elizabethan, this
same Captain John Smith, as he wrote it for the edification of young
seamen.
“Bend your passerado to the mayne-sayle, git the sailes to the yeards,
about your geare on all hands, hoyse your sayles halfe mast high,
make ready to set sayle, crosse your yeards, bring your Cable to the
Capsterne. Boatswaine, heave a head, men into the tops, men upon the
yeards. Come, is the anchor a pike? Heave out your topsayles, hawle
your sheates. What’s the Anchor away? Yea, yea. Let fall your fore
sayle. Who’s at the helme there? Coyle your cable in small slakes.
Hawle the cat, a bitter, belay, loufe (= luff), fast your Anchor with
your shanke painter, stow the boate. Let falle your maine saile, on
with your bonnets and drablers, steare study before the wind.
“The wind veares, git your star-boord tacks aboord, hawle off your ley
sheats ouerhawle the ley bowlin, ease your mayne brases, out with your
spret-saile, flat the fore sheat, pike up the misen or brade (= brail)
it. The ship will not wayer, loure the maine top saile, veare a fadome
of your sheat. A flown sheate, a faire winde and a boune voyage! The
wind shrinks. Get your tacks close aboord, make ready your loufe howks
(= luff hooks) and lay fagnes, to take off your bonnets and drablers,
hawle close your maine bowline.
“It ouervasts. We shall have wind. Sattle your top sailes, take in the
spret sayle. In with your topsayles. Lower your main sayles, tallow
under the parrels, in with your maine sayle, lower the fore sayle.
The sayle is split, brade up close all your sayles, lash sure the
Ordinances, strike your top masts to the cap, make them sure with your
sheepes feete. A storme, hull,[47] lash sure the helme a ley, lye to
try out drift.[48] How capes the ship? Cun the ship, spoune before the
winde. She lusts, she lyes under the Sea. Trie her with a crose jacke,
bowse it up with the outlooker. She will founder in the Sea, runne on
shore, split or billage on a Rocke, a wracke. Put out a goose-winge, or
a hullocke of a sayle.
[Illustration: DRAKE’S “REVENGE” AT SEA.]
“Faire weather! Set your fore sayle. Out with all your sailes. Get your
Larboard tackes aboord, hawle off your Starboord sheats, goe large,
laske, ware yawning. The ship’s at stayes, at backe-stayes. Ouer-set
the ship, flat about, handle your Sayles, or trim your sayles. Let
rise your tacks, hawle of your sheats. Rock-weede, adrift, or flotes!
One to the top to looke out for Land. A ship’s wake, the water way,
the weather bow, weather coyle. Lay the ship by the Ley, and heave the
lead, try the dipsie (= deep-sea) line. Bring the ship to rights,
fetch the log-line to try what way shee makes. Turne up the minute
glasse, observe the hight. Land, to make land, how beares it. Set it by
the Compasse. Cleare your leach-lines, beare in, beare off, or stand
off, or sheare off, beare up.
“Outward bound, homeward bound, shorten your Sailes, take in your
Sailes, come to an Anchor under the Ley of the weather shore, the Ley
shore, nealed too, looke to your stoppers. Your anchor comes home,
the ship’s a drift, vere out more Cable. Let fall your sheat Anchor,
land locked, mo(o)re the ship. A good Voyage, Armes, arme a skiffe, a
frigot, a pinnace, a ship, a squadron, a fleete. When you ride amongst
many ships, pike your yards.
“To the boat or skiffe belongs oares, a mast, a saile, a stay,
a halyard, sheats, a boat-hook, thoughts (= thwarts), thoules
(thole-pins), rudder, irons, bailes, a trar-pawling or yawning,
carlings, carling-knees, for the David (davit), the boates-wayles, a
dridge. To row a spell, hold-water, trim the boate, _vea, vea, vea,
vea, vea_, who saies Amen, one and all, for a dram of the bottle?”
Impressionist-writing you describe all this? Yes, certainly. But it
has the effect, has it not, of conveying just what we are attempting,
a general idea of the life of Elizabethan sailors at sea? “Many
supposeth,” writes this same author, “any thing is good enough to serve
men at sea, and yet nothing sufficient for them a shore, either for
their healthes, for their ease, or estates, or state.” ... “Some it may
bee will say I would have men rather to feast than fight. But I say the
want of those necessaries occasions the losse of more men than in any
English fleet hath bin slaine in any fight since (15)88: for when a man
is ill sicke, or at the poynt of death, I would know whether a dish
of buttered Rice, with a little Cinamon and Sugar, a little minced
meate, or roast beefe, a few stewed Prunes, a race of greene-ginger, a
flap Jacke, a can of fresh water brued with a little Cinamon, Ginger
and Sugar, be not better than a little poore John, or salt fish, with
oyle and mustard, or bisket, butter, cheese or oatemeale pottage on
fish dayes, salt beefe, porke and pease. This is your ordinary ship’s
allowance, and good for them are well, if well-conditioned, which is
not alwayes, as seamen can too well witnesse: and after a storme, when
poore men are all wet, and some not so much a cloth to shift him,
shaking with cold, few of those but will tell you a little Sacke or
Aquvitæ is much better to keepe them in health, then a little small
beere or cold water, although it be sweete.”
The sea literature of the Elizabethan period is rich in illustrations
of the ways employed. Shakespeare, whom some critics verily believe
to have been a sailor--so unfailingly accurate are his numerous sea
terms--here and there, and especially in “The Tempest,” reflects a good
deal of the life on board ship. In such logs as the voyages of the
great Arctic explorer John Davis, there is many a nautical expression
that cannot fail to arrest our attention. And in order to complete the
impressionistic sketch of Captain John Smith, permit me here to bring
to the reader’s notice some of the phrases which I have collected from
other sources of this period.
There were various expressions used to mean heaving-to: thus “strake
suddenly ahull” to signify “suddenly hove-to.” So also “tried under our
maine course, sometimes with a haddock of our sail,” as Davis has it,
or “a hullocke of a sayle,” as Smith expresses it. Perhaps it was thus
that the synonym “try-sail” originated, signifying a small handkerchief
of canvas with which to lie comfortably hove-to. “The third day being
calme, at noone we strooke saile, and let fall a cadge anker.” “Cadge”
is spelt “kedge” nowadays. They used to “let slippe” their cables--made
of hemp--from the “halse” or hawse-pipe. But sometimes “the cable of
our shut (= sheet) anker brake.” “For the straines (= strands) of one
of our cables were broken, we only road by an olde junke!” (Junk is
still sailor’s slang for worn-out rope.) In those days when there was
no such thing as telegraph or post, when ships traversing the ocean
were so few as unlikely to meet except rarely, months and years went by
without news of mariners. But sometimes when an outward-bound English
ship met a fellow-countryman homeward-bound, an effort was made to send
letters back. There was an instance of this during Davis’s third voyage
when two days out from Dartmouth. They met the _Red Lion_ of London
sailing home from Spain. So they hailed the latter and asked her master
to carry letters back to London. “And after we had heaved them a lead
and a line, whereunto wee had made fast our letters, before they could
get them into the ship, they fell into the sea, and so all our labour
and theirs was also lost.”
Happily there still exists the “Traverse-Booke,” which Davis made
during his third voyage, when he set out to discover that north-west
passage which was only found in the present decade by Captain Roald
Amundsen, who also was the first to reach the South Pole. And I
cannot believe that even a brief extract of Davis’s sailing will fail
to be of the greatest interest to modern seamen, whether amateur or
professional. I have therefore thought fit to append the following,
which covers the first nine days beginning from the time when his
little fleet of three, consisting of the “barke” _Elizabeth_, the
“barke” _Sunneshine_, and the “Clincher” _Helene_, weighed their
anchors and set sail from Dartmouth.
A Traverse-Booke made by M. John Davis in his third voyage for the
discoverie of the North-West passage, Anno 1587.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Moneth. | | | |ELEVATION | THE |
|HOURES.|COURSE. |LEAGUES.| OF THE | WINDE. |
DAYES.| | | | POLE. | | THE DISCOURSE.
| | | | | |
MAY. | | | |Deg.|Mins.| |
---------+-------+---------+--------+----+-----+--------+--------------------
19 | | W S W | | 50 | 30 | N E |This day we departed
| |Westerly | | | | | from Dartmouth at
| | | | | | | two of the clocke
| | | | | | | at night.
20 | | | | | | |
21 | 35 | W S W | 50 | 50 | | N E |This day we descried
| |Westerly | | | | | Silly N W by W
| | | | | | | from us.
| | | | | | |
22 | 15 | W N W | 14 | | |N E by E|This day at noone
| | | | | | | we departed
| | | | | | | from Silly.
22 | 6 | W N W | 6 | | |N E by E|
22 | 3 | W N W | 2 | | | |
23 | 15 |N W by W | 18 | | | N E |
| 39 | W N W | 36 | 50 | 40 | |The true course,
| | | | | | | distance and
| | | | | | | latitude.
| 3 | W N W | 2 | | | N N E |
| 6 |N W by W | 5 | | |N E by N|
| 3 | W N W | 3 | | | N N E |
| 12 | W N W | 12 | | | N E |
Noone the| 24 | W N W | 25 | 51 | 16 | |The true course,
24 | |Northerly| | | | | distance, and
| | | | | | | latitude.
| 3 | W N W | 3 | | | N N E |
| 3 | W N W | 2½ | | | N by E |
| 6 | W by N | 5 | | | N |
| 6 | W by N | 5 | | | N |
| 2 | S | ½ | | | N |Now we lay upon the
| | | | | | | lee for the
| | | | | | | Sunshine, which
| | | | | | | had taken a leake
| | | | | | | of 500 strokes in
| | | | | | | a watch.
| | | | | | |
| | | | | | |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The phrase “lay upon the lee” is just another way of saying they
hove-to. “A leake of 500 strokes in a watch” was identical with saying
that they had to work the pumps to that number in such a period.
It should be added, further, that by “elevation of the pole” is, of
course, meant the ship’s latitude.
Some of the vessels of the sixteenth century were terribly slow
creatures. There was a nickname given to those lethargic coasters
which, because they could not do much against the current and had to
proceed from one roadstead to another and there anchor till the tide
turned, were known as “roaders.” No one who has made himself familiar
with their long and trying voyages could ever accuse the Elizabethan
seamen of cowardice in bad weather. Once, Davis relates, when his ship
was fighting her way through a storm, her mainsail blew right out of
her; whereupon the master of the ship crept along the mainyard, which
had now been lowered down to the rails, and gathering the sail as it
was hauled out of the sea, gallantly fought with it and succeeded in
bending it again to the yard, “being in the meane while oft-times
ducked over head and eares into the sea.”
The reader will remember just now in the extract from Smith the
expression “she lusts” for “she lists.” Among hundreds of our English
seamen in this twentieth century “lust” is still used to mean “list.”
Smith, as we saw, also wrote “spoune before the wind.” Davis, too,
related that “we spooned before the sea,” the exact meaning being that
they drove before the gale under bare poles. The latter also uses the
expression “a mighty fret of weather” to mean “a mighty squall.” Those
who are familiar with the language of the fishermen on the north-east
coast of England will call to mind their word “sea-fret” to denote a
fog approaching the land.
[Illustration: SIXTEENTH-CENTURY SEAMEN STUDYING THE ART OF NAVIGATION.
After a Contemporary Artist.
Notice the compass, the hour-glass, globes, cross-staff, charts, etc.]
Few nautical words are so well known to us as “skipper.” Before the
sixteenth century was ended the Dutch seamen had fraternised a good
deal with the sailors of England. The Low Countries were fast
becoming great shipbuilders and navigators, and not unnaturally some
of their phrases began to be used by our men. The Dutch word to this
day which is used to mean captain is still “schipper,” and among the
English seamen at the end of the sixteenth century the equivalent
“shipper” was employed to refer to the same personage. There were
other slang phrases prevalent, such as a “light-horseman” to mean
a fast-pulling gig. So also Davis speaks of a “trade” wind to mean
regular and steady. “The wind blowing a trade,” he remarks. But some
of these phrases employed by seamen of those days are a little less
obvious. “Tressle-trees,” for example, might puzzle many a modern
sailorman. “This night we perished our maine tressle-trees, so that
wee could no more use our maine top-saile.” These trestle-trees were
just a couple of strong pieces of wood, or of iron, and were fitted one
on either side of the lower masthead so as to support the heel of the
topmast. Such expressions as “ground-tackle” are as frequently employed
to-day as then, but over and over again we find that a ship “came
roome,” “bare roome with her,” to mean that the former came to leeward,
put up her helm and bore away.
Anxious as he naturally was concerning a thousand matters, the life
of the captain at sea was many degrees happier than that of his crew.
At least he had a decent cabin and bed in which to sleep and take his
meals and sip his punch, otherwise known as “Rosa Solis,” consisting
of brandy, spices, and hot water. But the seamen’s comforts were
disgracefully neglected, with the result that they died in dozens. Some
more humane captains such as John Smith did their best for the men;
but this was exceptional. And yet it was a thoroughly unsanitary age.
Davis himself admits that many of his crew were “eaten with lice” as
big as beans. Monson includes among the causes of the discouraging of
seamen the inexperienced commanders who were put over them, the bad
victuals which they had to endure, the dishonesty in serving them--the
beef, for instance, given so that five men had to partake of four
men’s allowance--and the delay which was made in paying their wages.
Especially were these abuses noticeable during the early years of
the seventeenth century. Men were impressed into the service even in
those days, though there were volunteers as well. At the time of the
Armada our sailors received as wages fourpence a day, but this was paid
quarterly. In addition, of course, there was sometimes prize money
in the proportions already mentioned. In Monson’s time complaint was
made of the kind of foremast men who were pressed into the service “to
pleasure friends.” Such men as “taylors, porters, and others of that
rank, unworthy of the hatches to lie on,” were brought aboard and given
no less than £1 11s. a month. And yet, when opportunity allowed, the
captain used to send his crew ashore in the ship’s boats “to walk in
the fields ... to take the air.” But among the officers there was too
much “excessive banqueting on board” and a great waste of powder, as,
for instance, when guns were fired at the drinking of a man’s health.
And the same authority has something very interesting to tell us
concerning the ceremonial wearing of the flag on board ship. I have
no intention of confusing our chronological sequence, but I must ask
the reader for a moment to recall that incident which was one of the
indirect if not the real causes of the first Anglo-Dutch wars. It will
be remembered--which English schoolboy does not remember it well?--that
when Captain Young, one May Day in 1652, was bound down Channel
and met a convoy of Dutchmen coming up, he was angered to find the
foreigner declined to salute, and an engagement immediately followed.
Now, writing long before that incident had ever occurred, Monson
definitely states that if a foreign fleet should pass on our seas
and meet our admiral’s ship, the former were expected to acknowledge
our sovereignty by coming under the lee of the admiral, by striking
their topsails and taking in their flag. “And this hath never been
questioned,” he adds, except out of ignorance, as in the case of Philip
II, when he met the Lord Admiral of England when the former was sailing
to England in order to marry Queen Mary. The custom was that if any
foreign ship were to arrive in one of our ports or to pass a fort or
castle, she must, as she entered, and before coming to anchor, take in
her flag three times “and advance it again.” But should the English
admiral be in the harbour, the foreigner was not to display his flag at
all.
Prior to the reign of James I, all admirals wore the St. George’s flag
at the topmast head. But when the Union of Scotland had been effected
there was added the cross of St. Andrew. An admiral at anchor took in
his flag in the evening and fired a gun and set the watch. “The flag
carried under the poop of a ship,” he remarks, “shews a disgrace,” and
is never used except when it is won or taken from an enemy.
Jealousy of Spain and greed of gold had as much to do with the impetus
given to English seamanship and navigation during Elizabethan times as
any inherent love of the sea. To meet this new zeal various writers,
some of whom we have already mentioned, set to work to write treatises
that would turn raw agricultural labourers and tavern-haunters into
fighting sailors and navigators. William Bourne, from whom we have
already quoted, in his “Regiment for the Sea” was the first to give
a book on navigation written by an Englishman. This was in the year
1573, and a rare example of this little work is still preserved in
the British Museum. In it he pointed out the various ways for finding
the variation of the compass, exposed the errors of the plane charts,
and advised mariners in sailing towards high latitudes to keep their
reckoning by the globe, as in those regions the plane chart was most
likely to land them into trouble.
In 1594 John Davis, the Arctic explorer, published his “The Seaman’s
Secrets.” This book became very popular, and took the place of the
Spanish Martin Cortes’ handbook, which had been used in the English
translation. There is a vast amount of matter in Davis’ “Secrets” which
is worth perusing even by the modern navigator. He speaks of “great
Circle navigation,” and gives a whole host of valuable practical hints.
“The Instruments necessarie for a skilfull seaman,” he explains, “are
a Sea Compasse, a Cross staffe, a Quadrant, an Astrolabe, a Chart, an
instrument magneticall[49] for the finding of the variation of the
Compasse, an Horizontall plaine Sphere, a Globe, and a paradoxall
Compasse”[50] ... “but the Sea Compasse, Chart and Crosse staffe
are instruments sufficient for the seaman’s use, the astrolabie and
quadrant being ... very uncertaine.” In this book he gives instruction
as to tides, stars, and how to use the astrolabe. And it is worth
noting that he speaks of the English Channel after the fashion of our
Gallic neighbours, who still refer to “La manche.” “Our Channell,” he
explains, “commonly called the Sleue” (sleeve).
[Illustration: CHART OF A.D. 1589.
Showing the dividing line between the Old World and the New.
It will be recollected that the Pope had drawn an imaginary line North
and South, a hundred leagues west of the Azores, leaving all that lay
east thereof to the Portuguese, and all that lay west to the Spanish.]
Everyone knows that longitude is the distance east or west of a given
meridian. In those days Greenwich did not enter into the matter: the
observatory there had still to be founded. When Davis wrote in the year
1594 there was no variation at St. Michael’s in the Azores, and so the
longitude was reckoned from there. “Longitude,” he defines, “is that
portion of the Equator contained betweene the Meridian of S. Michel’s,
one of the Assores, and the Meridian of the place whose longitude is
desired: the reason why the accompt of longitude doth begin at this Ile
is, because that there the compasse hath no variety.”
Be it remembered, also, that it was Davis who improved the cross-staff
and superseded the clumsy astrolabe for taking meridian altitudes at
sea. It was commonly spoken of as Davis’s quadrant, and was afterwards
improved by Flamstead with the addition of a glass lens. Subsequently
it was further improved by Halley, and as such was used almost
exclusively till the year 1731, when it was in turn superseded by
Halley’s quadrant. When we read again the entrancing narratives given
in Hakluyt and elsewhere of the Elizabethan voyages into the unknown,
let us note that reposing somewhere in the high poop of these ships
there were most probably all the following instruments for navigating
the trackless seas. There was a calendar, an astrolabe, a cross-staff,
a celestial globe, a terrestrial globe, a universal horloge for knowing
the hour of the day in every latitude, a nocturne labe for telling the
hour of the night, one or more compasses, a navigation chart, a general
map, and a printed chart.
[Illustration: SHIP DESIGNER WITH HIS ASSISTANT.
This illustration belongs to the latter half of the sixteenth century,
or the beginning of the seventeenth, and is among the Pepysian MSS. in
Magdalene College, Cambridge. Pepys’ own title for this is “Fragments
of Ancient English Shipwrightry.”]
It was in 1599 that Edward Wright published his “Haven-finding Art.” In
his volume “Certaine Errors in Navigation,” he complains of the errors
in the proportions of the existing charts. These consisted in wrongly
showing the distances of places. He speaks also of sailing “by a
great Circle, which is to bee drawne by those two places,” and asserts
that this is a better method than sailing always at right angles to
the meridian. In practically all the charts of this age the surface
was ruled with rhumb-lines from the thirty-two points of the compass,
as is still the case to-day on certain Dutch charts. The origin of the
word “rhumb” was Portuguese, and doubtless these lines appeared on the
earliest Portuguese charts. In the first of these two books, Wright
also furnished a table of variations of the compass in different parts
of the world.
As to the practical side of navigation, Bourne exhorted his mariners to
remember that the earth is a globe and not a “platforme,” as “generally
the most parte of the seamen make their account.” The meridians, he
reminded them, grow narrower towards the two poles. If one had occasion
to voyage northward it were better to sail by the globe, he suggested.
Therefore you should keep a perfect account of the ship’s course. Then
resort to your globe and consider what place and parallel you are in
(by means of the sun at day and the stars at night). Knowing where you
are, set your globe to the elevation of your pole, and then turn to the
place of your zenith and seek the opposite of it in your parallel, for
then you know that in the same parallel is your east and west line.
Then the just quarter of that circle to the pole must be divided into
the eight points of your compass, doing so likewise on the other side.
From the southern voyages the “plats or cardes for the sea” were
recommended. Bourne strongly advised against painting their compasses
with so many colours on these charts and so many flags on the land, but
bade them use the vacant places left on the paper for better objects,
such as the time of high water at certain states of the moon, and the
elevation of the land, in order that the appearance of the latter
might not be mistaken. The use of sea cardes for navigating during long
voyages he regards as very necessary for three reasons: they show you
(1) how one place bears from another; (2) the distances between the
places; (3) in what latitude any place is. But the master or pilot of
the ship is also to bear in mind the effect of tides, currents, the
surging of the sea or scantiness of the wind, which might put the ship
to leeward of her course. Also in long voyages the wind might shift
ahead, so the mariner must keep a perfect account of his courses and
mark each new course on the chart, and pay regard to the “swiftnesse”
or “slownesse” of the ships. If the weather be clear he was to take the
true altitude of the pole, which will correct the ship’s course and
give “a very neare gesse” how the port of destination bears and how far.
The compass was variously known in the Elizabethan age as the
“sea-directorie,” the “nauticall box,” and the “sea-compasse.”
Lightbody describes the bittacles as “little wooden pins for nailing
the compass-box withal.” The first atlas was published in Dutch at
Leyden in 1585 by Wagenaer. In this are to be found excellent coloured
charts of the Narrow Seas. It is evident from these that there was
a system of buoyage even in those days. There are barrel buoys, for
instance, and basket beacons such as you can still find in use to-day
in different parts of Holland. The sands on the port hand of the Swin
Middle at the entrance to the Thames Estuary are shown marked by
staff-and-triangle marks. This excellent atlas was soon translated into
English, so that the elaborate sailing directions and the admirable
little contours of the coast--crude but useful--could be placed at
the service of English mariners. This English version was known
as Wagenaer’s “Mariner’s Mirrour,” and there was also “The Sea
Mirrour,” translated from the Dutch of William Johnson Blaeu by Richard
Hynmers in 1625, which was another of the numerous nautical books of
this time, containing instruction in practical navigation, sailing
directions, charts, and contours.
[Illustration: A CHART OF THE THAMES ESTUARY.
(Dover to Orfordness.) This is taken from the first Atlas ever
published, viz., in 1585.]
[Illustration: “HOW YOU MAY AT ONE STATION MEASURE UPPON AN HEIGTH WITH
A GEOMETRICALL SQUARE A LONGITUDE UPPON PLAINE.”
This is from Lucar’s sixteenth-century treatise on gunnery, and
illustrates the use of the “geometricall square” for finding the
distance between the galley and the ship, viz. 300 yards. This
instrument was made of metal or cypress, the quadrant being divided
into 90 degrees. It was used for measuring “altitudes, latitudes
and profundities,” and so very valuable for all gunnery work.
]
The hourly or half-hourly glasses used on board were turned by the
sentry, who struck the ship’s bell at every half-hour just as on
shipboard to-day. The only means of keeping correct time in those days
was by observing the heavenly bodies, and this gave time at ship. But
frequently the navigators were many miles out in their longitude, since
the latter is found by comparing the exact time at ship with the time
by a chronometer showing the time at the prime meridian.
Nicholas Tartaglia, in his “Three Bookes of Colloquies concerning
the Arte of Shooting,” published in the year of the Armada, gives
an interesting illustration to indicate how one could know by the
help of a gunner’s circle the number of miles or feet any ship lying
in the roadstead was distant; and also how to measure height with
a geometrical square. And Bourne, in his “Treasure for Traueilers”
(1578), had a method for ascertaining the “waight of any shyp swimmyng
on the water.” The reader will remember that when we were discussing
Columbus we pointed out the lack of that useful instrument, the log and
line, for indicating the distance which a vessel sailed. It was William
Bourne who first published an idea for overcoming this difficulty in
a somewhat ingenious manner. In his “Inventions and Devices” (1578),
he gives a method whereby “to know the way or going of a ship, for
to knowe how fast or softly that any ship goeth.” The idea is too
complicated to be given here in detail, but practically it amounted to
towing astern a tiny boat containing a paddle-wheel which revolved,
and so by a species of clockwork registered the speed. Excepting that
the patent log of to-day is helicular, there is much resemblance
between the old and the new in at least the bare idea. But a little
later--in the year 1637--Richard Norwood published, in his “Seaman’s
Practice,” a whole chapter on the subject “Of dividing the Log-line and
reckoning the Ship’s way.” The log-line was to be used in conjunction
with the glass, and this method was little altered until the
nineteenth-century invention of the patent log had to be brought about
owing to the great speed of steamships.
[Illustration: SIXTEENTH-CENTURY SHIP BEFORE THE WIND.
By a Contemporary Artist. Notice the square lids over the portholes.]
Before we conclude this chapter we must not omit to say something of
the improvement in naval strategy, tactics, and discipline during
the Elizabethan period. You will remember that important campaign of
1587, when Drake took an expedition out to Cadiz, sunk and burnt an
enormous quantity of the enemy’s tonnage, repulsed the attacks of the
Mediterranean galleys--completely beating this type of craft at her
own special game and in her own waters--captured large quantities of
supplies intended for the Armada, and demonstrated himself to be no man
of medieval conceptions, but a modern strategist by waiting at Cape St.
Vincent, where he held the real key to the situation--able to prevent
the fleets from Cartagena and Cadiz from reaching Lisbon. You will
remember, too, that after terrorising the Spaniards and their galleys
he set a course for the Azores, captured the mammoth _San Felipe_,
homeward bound from the East Indies with a cargo that, reckoned in the
money value of to-day, was worth over £1,000,000; and what was more,
discovered from the ship’s papers the long-kept secrets of the East
Indian trade. Finally, during that same historic voyage, when friction
broke out between the modern strategist Drake and his medieval-minded
vice-admiral William Borough, the latter was promptly court-martialled,
tried on board the flagship by Drake, Fenner, and the other captains,
and deposed from his command.
Now, what was the net result of all this? We may sum the matter up
in the following statement. It gave the death-blow to the medieval
methods of fighting and inaugurated the scientific idea of strategy.
It demonstrated the fact that even in those circumstances when the
big sailing ship was at her worst, viz. fighting in sheltered waters
and in a flat calm, when the galley was certainly at her very best,
yet the former could annihilate the latter. Contrariwise, the capture
of the _San Felipe_ showed that even the biggest ship afloat could be
made a prisoner if only the captor went about the matter in the right
way. And, finally, it inaugurated real naval discipline, even for the
highest placed officer, and instituted the Court Martial.
And yet during the time of Elizabeth, though her admirals realised the
value of strategy, yet they failed to understand fleet tactics. There
was no regular order of battle. Howard’s fleet against the Armada in
1588 had been in action twice before it was organised into proper
squadrons. During that nine days’ fighting the old idea of boarding,
that had continued from the Greek and Roman days, through Viking and
medieval times till the sixteenth century, was clearly giving way
to the practice of broadside gunnery. But what is important to note
is the fact that though the Elizabethan admirals were realising the
superiority of the gun to the boarding pike, yet they had not become
sufficiently logical to devise a battle order for enabling their guns
to be used to the best advantage. Nevertheless, there was a partial
appreciation of this important principle. The idea of fighting in
line-ahead was certainly in their minds, and there was a tendency
for the fleet to break up into groups, each group delivering its
broadsides in succession on an exposed part of the enemy’s formation.
A contemporary chart depicting the Armada and the English fleet at the
different stages of fighting in the English Channel unquestionably
shows the Queen’s ships standing out in line-ahead formation from
Plymouth Sound, getting the weather gage of the enemy, and then
firing into them from the windward side. Spanish evidence admits that
the English were “in very fine order.” And it is quite curious
to observe that though Spain and Portugal had led the way towards
scientific seamanship and navigation, and England had followed, yet the
Spaniards still looked upon gunnery as a dishonourable practice, still
retained the medieval idea that gentlemen would fight only with swords;
and therefore these South Europeans, unable to fight at a distance,
used their best endeavours to close with our ships and carry on the
contest after the manner of the tactics which Greek and Roman and
Viking and Crusader had adopted.
[Illustration: EARLY SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY SHIP OF WAR.
By a Contemporary Artist.]
It is true, also, that the Portuguese showed no little courage and
enterprise in their shipbuilding. Some of their fifteenth-century
caracks were four-deckers, of fifteen hundred and two thousand tons,
with forty guns and a thousand sailors, soldiers, and passengers.
And, even if they were not by disposition and natural endowment great
sailors, yet they were splendid navigators. But they were never great
shipbuilders in the scientific sense, since they built by rule of
thumb. The Portuguese had, indeed, done much for cartography, and
yet until the Dutch Gerard Mercator introduced his “Mappemonde” in
1569, containing a new method of projecting a sphere upon a plane,
the problem of how to sail in a straight line over a curved figure
still lacked solution. The Dutch Wagenaer, of whom we spoke just now,
historically certainly owed a great deal to the achievements of the
Portuguese and Spanish, but already by the year 1577 he had written on
navigation. His charts of Dutch harbours and of the Narrow Seas were,
for their limited purpose, of more value than any charts which had come
from the South of Europe.
It has been well said by a careful writer that British seamanship has
been historically the cause of British supremacy, and that most British
sea fights have been decided by bringing single ships to close action,
laying ship against ship. If this statement is true, it is especially
applicable to the Elizabethan period, when seamanship was our strong
point and tactics our weakest. Never before had English sailors reached
such a high degree of proficiency therein; never in so short a time had
it done so much to mould national history, and to lay the foundations
of an Empire.