The Capacity Of The "Long-Boat" We Know To Have Been About
Twenty Persons, As Nearly That Number Is Shown By Bradford And Winslow
To Have Gone In Her On The Early Expeditions From The Ship, At Cape Cod.
She Would Therefore Accommodate Only About One Sixth Of The Ship's
Company.
As the "gig" would carry only five or six persons, - while the
shallop was stowed between decks and could be of no service in case of
need upon the voyage, - the inference is warranted that other boats were
carried, which fail of specific mention, or that she was wofully
lacking.
The want of boats for unlading, mentioned by Bradford, suggests
the possibility that some of the ship's quota may have been lost or
destroyed on her boisterous voyage, though no such event appears of
record, or is suggested by any one. In the event of wreck, the Pilgrims
must have trusted, like the Apostle Paul and his associates when cast
away on the island of Melita, to get to shore, "some on boards and some
on broken pieces of the ship." Her steering-gear, rigging, and the
mechanism for "getting her anchors," "slinging," "squaring," and
"cockbilling" her yards; for "making" and "shortening" sail; "heaving
out" her boats and "handling" her cargo, were of course all of the crude
and simple patterns and construction of the time, usually so well
illustrating the ancient axiom in physics, that "what is lost [spent] in
power is gained in time."
The compass-box and hanging-compass, invented by the English cleric,
William Barlow, but twelve years before the Pilgrim voyage, was almost
the only nautical appliance possessed by Captain Jones, of the
MAY-FLOWER, in which no radical improvement has since been made.
Few charts of much value - especially of western waters - had yet been
drafted, but the rough maps and diagrams of Cabot, Smith, Gosnold,
Pring, Champlain and Dermer, Jones was too good a navigator not to have
had. In speaking of the landing at Cape Cod, the expression is used by
Bradford in "Mourt's Relation," "We went round all points of the
compass," proving that already the mariner's compass had become familiar
to the speech even of those not using it professionally.
That the ship was "well-found" in anchors (with solid stocks), hemp
cables, "spare" spars, "boat-tackling" and the heavy "hoisting-gear" of
those days, we have the evidence of recorded use. "The MAY-FLOWER,"
writes Captain Collins, would have had a hemp cable about 9 inches in
circumference. Her anchors would probably weigh as follows: sheet anchor
(or best bower) 500 to 600 lbs.; stream anchor 350 to 400 lbs.; the spare
anchors same as the stream anchor.
"Charnock's Illustrations" show that the anchors used in the MAY-FLOWER
period were shaped very much like the so called Cape Ann anchor now made
for our deep-sea fishing vessels. They had the conventional shaped
flukes, with broad pointed palms, and a long shank, the upper end passing
through a wooden stock.
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