Page 343 - The Ashley Book of Knots

THE ASHLEY BOOK OF KNOTS

2058. A hitch to a cylinder. If a window weight is too large it may

be broken with a hammer and both halves used. One end, having no

hole, requires a special attachment. First seize the rope and open

it to the seizing, then open the strands into their individual yarns.

With the standing part upward and the yarns hanging downward,

ton

arrange them evenly around the end of the weight and seize with a

CONSTRICTOR KNOT ('# I 249). Next proceed with marline to graft

2060

the yarns to the cylinder as described in '# 35 57. Finally seize all ends.

2059. CROSS GRAFTING is more secure than regular grafting for this

purpose. The method is described as '#3563.

2060. A practical and expeditious way is to tape the window

weight in a right helix, then to twist the yarns evenly over the

taped section in an opposite helix to the left. Finally round over the

yarns with marline in a tight right helix. Whip and snake the ends.

I

2061. A lizard trap from Guinea, taken from a Smithsonian Ethno-

logical Report. A gap is left in the wall of a light stockade and a

crossbar is lashed across the top. The rope is secured to a strong

2.061 springy sapling, the end of which is to be hauled down above the

gap. A NOOSE is put in the end of the rope. Two loose sticks are

arranged as in the picture, and a SLIPPERY HITCH holds the NOOSE

and the otherwise loose sticks in position, until one or the other is

disturbed by an animal attempting to pass through the gap. The

knots are a SLIPPERY HITCH and a NOOSE arranged as shown. Other

traps are shown under "Shooting," "The Trapper," and "The

Poacher" in Chapter 2.

2062. An old mounting on a Provincetown Arctic "iron" or har-

poon. A WALL KNOT ('# 67 I) is tied in the end of the mounting,

which is made fast to the harpoon socket with two round seizings

2. 06)
(#3388). The rope is five ana a half feet long. The whale line is

bent with a DOUBLE BECKET HITCH ('# 1902).

2063. The mounting for a sperm-whale iron, which is about twelve

inches shorter than the former, due to the thinner blubber of the

Temperate Zone whale. It is seized in the same way as the former,

but the two seizings are nearer together to allow of grafting

. ('#3557), which starts well up on the socket of the iron .

'
.- . • .'
'
.- .-'" 2064. Latching is an old method of attaching a drab bier to a jib,

.' •
-'

or a bonnet to a fore and aft sail. Nowadays it is the method em-

...... __ ........ _ ... ___ ... __ 0

ployed by circuses in assembling the canvas sections of the tents.

A series of eyelets in the upper section of the sail are opposite a

series of loops, termed "keys," in the headrope of the bonnet. Start-

ing at one side, a key is rove through the opposite eyelet and hauled

2065
to the next eye. The next key is rove through its opposite eye and

through the key that was first led. This process is continued until

the center is reached. The process is then repeated, beginning at the

other edge of the sail. The two center loops, being twice as long as

the rest, are reef knotted together. Captain John Smith described

them in 1627, calling them "latchets."

2065. The Chinese windlass is the grandfather of the present-day

differential chain hoist. One end winds, while the other unwinds,

and the right end of the barrel, being larger than the left, winds or

unwinds a greater length of rope than the left end, with each revolu-

tion of the crank.

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