Page 67 - Frank Rosenow "Seagoing Knots"

“My brother and I raced and cruised her right up to the outbreak of the
war in 1939. At that time we had a paid hand who was known as ‘Tar¬
brush.’ He came from the east coast of Scotland and was most disrespect¬
ful but a most excellent seaman. He got very drunk on occasion.”
The knot favored by Olaf was the lark’s head. It served for everything
from hanging pictures and implements to slinging the mainsail ties to the
lifelines.
To join lines reliably, he often had two eyes meeting in a lark’s head.
Where a safe but quick release coupling was needed, he would perma¬
nently attach a sling to the object, as instanced by a lead weight in the

drawing, and putting the sling into a loop at the end of the main line, pop
the object through.
Later, I adapted the system to attach a varying number of lead weights to
the snatch block that rides down Moth’s anchor line to give a better angle
of pull along the bottom.
In a couple of places, Olaf also used the lark’s head as a conventional tie
for the end of a cord, letting an overhand or figure eight knot transfer the
pull on to the single part—as seen in the drawing.

KNOTS
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